The Pit
by Kirinin
Summary: "Sometimes his daddy did silly things, like pretend to leave him places, but he always came back.  Maybe this was a game like those games."  When Genma leaves Ranma to learn the Neko-ken, he doesn't return.
1. Lesson

This story deals with themes that may be triggery for some, including child abuse and abandonment, and many of the associated emotional complications. Gender issues are explored as well, and I think to the degree that it might be triggering for some.

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Chapter One: Lesson

* * *

The cuts didn't just hurt anymore, they _burned_.

Ranma had long since stopped calling for his father; he'd figured out that his daddy wasn't going to come until nightfall after the second day. The scratches had been bad, and that night he'd dreamed of eyes glowing like lamplight in the dark, but that moment when his father had pulled him out had been so confusing and also so good.

Ranma's daddy had pulled him close and told him how proud he was, how strong a martial artist Ranma was going to grow up to be. How if Ranma could just hang on a little longer, the cats would teach him an incredible lesson.

Ranma was already a martial artist, used to things hurting in the short term and paying off in the long term, so he dried his tears and snot against his father's gi and nodded. He could spend more time with the – the – _those things_. He could: he was strong; he was a big boy, like his daddy said. It was only another day, and after that he'd get to feel those big strong arms around him, comforting him, telling him that he'd been good, that he'd done well, that he was going to grow up to be a Man Amongst Men.

One day more. He could do anything for one day.

Only, when night fell, his daddy didn't come.

Ranma didn't dare to sleep because that was when the cats awoke. Some of them, maddened by the nighttime and the confined space, darted from one side of the pit to the other without ceasing. Some began to fight, to bite, kick and scratch at one another. Still others began to yowl.

Ranma put his hands over his ears and curled up with his back to the dirt. A kitten made its way over to him and butted its head against his hand. Ranma scooped it up and held it close. It was a baby, and Ranma knew he should protect it from the grown-up cats, who were bad.

As the sun rose, the cats finally settled down, found a darkened spot and began to slumber. Only then did Ranma drop off to sleep.

When he woke again, the slant of the light told him it was late afternoon. Ranma was clever, or so he'd been told: not many little boys could tell what time of day it was by looking at the position of the sun, or knew so much about the night sky as he did. Surely, his father would be back by now.

"Daddy?"

There was no reply.

"Daddy!"

Nothing. Ranma knew better than to try again. His last shout had been plenty loud enough. If it was time to get out of the pit, his father would come for him. Until then, he just had to be patient, and wait. Sometimes his daddy did silly things, like pretend to leave him places, but he always came back. Maybe this was a game like those games.

When night approached, Ranma felt himself grow increasingly fidgety. The kitten had woken several times, and so had some of the other cats. That was fine: when only one or two of them were active at a time, Ranma found this to be acceptable. But now they were awakening again, stretching, making pitiful mewling noises.

Ranma figured they were hungry, just like him. He clutched the kitten to him: they were not going to get to it. His daddy always told him to protect the weak, and the kitten was the weakest of every living thing in the pit. He had to make sure to keep it safe. It was what a real martial artist, a real Man Among Men, would do.

Throughout the night, Ranma's eyes were wide as he clutched the kitten which, in a bout of common sense odd for a cat, had decided to stick with the small boy. At one point in the darkest part of the night there was a strangled-off yowl from the other side of the pit; Ranma did not move to investigate.

In the morning he was glad he hadn't. One of the cats had died, and its corpse was nearly picked to pieces.

Ranma was a well-traveled child; he'd seen plenty of animals killed for food. He'd seen a hawk take a hare once, just swoop straight out of the sky only a few meters away from their camp in the mountains. But this was different. The day before, that creature had been a living thing. He imagined that it had talked to the other cats. He wondered what it had said to them. And then they'd – done what they'd done, and –

Ranma buried his face in the kitten's fur. "No," he said. "No. No! I don't wanna be a martial artist anymore, daddy! Please come get me! Please, I want out! Please – HELP!"

Some providence must have been on Ranma's side; or perhaps it was his inherent disobedience, as he'd been told to keep as quiet as a mouse. Whatever it was that caused him to shout at that particular moment, it saved his life.

A young man happened upon the hole dug into the ground. He peered down and winced. "Shit," he hissed under his breath. "Oh, _shit_."

(He was not, actually, the sort that swore, around children least of all. But it was hard not to, for many reasons.)

Ranma looked up. "Hello? Could you find my daddy for me? He left."

The young man shook his head. "Jesus, sweetheart," he breathed. "I'm gonna get you out of there. But first I want you to go up against that side. All the way, all right? Press up against that wall."

Ranma was puzzled. For one thing, no one had ever called him a sweetheart before, and he was worried that the young man thought from such a distance that he might be a girl. The very idea was anathema to him. It was very important he become a Man Amongst Men. Now that rescue loomed on the horizon, he forgot how rapidly he'd renounced martial arts. "I'm waiting for my daddy," he said stubbornly. "Have you seen him?"

The young man shook his head, but something about the motion didn't look precisely like a negation to Ranma.

"Have you?"

"No, but we need to get you out of there now, do you understand?"

Ranma nodded. "I'm hungry," he said.

"I have some things to eat," the young man said.

That decided it. "This wall?" Ranma said.

"That wall is as good as any other."

Ranma pressed himself good and hard against the dirt wall like the young man said. "What are you gonna do?"

"I'm going to bring down this side. It'll allow enough dirt to break away that you'll be able to clamber up."

Ranma nodded though he wasn't sure how that was going to work.

The young man took a deep breath, then struck the ground on the opposite side of Ranma's pit with one extended finger. To Ranma's amazement, a crack spread through the rock and dirt until it created a tiny landslide.

Unsurprisingly, the cats leapt out far before Ranma, screeching and wailing in their attempts to escape. For an instant Ranma felt bad for them. Maybe they weren't evil. Maybe they just didn't like to be down in a pit without anything to eat. Daddy couldn't even tell them that it was for their own good so that they became stronger cats, because they were too dumb to understand him. It was no wonder they were so mean to each other and to Ranma.

Then the young man was descending, which was good because Ranma felt a little shaky on his feet. Not that he'd say so to this stranger, but he wasn't sure he could make it out without help.

The stranger kneeled down in front of Ranma. "Is anything broken? Any bruises too bad? Did you bang your head?"

Ranma shook his head at all of these silly questions. All the while, the young man tilted Ranma's head left and right as though examining his face, then felt along his ribs in a way that kind of tickled.

"No? Good." The young man swept Ranma up in his arms, then paused. "What have you got there?"

Ranma clutched the kitten tighter to him. "I need to protect her."

The stranger clucked his tongue. "Guess so," he said, eventually. "It's a big, scary world out there."

Ranma nodded, solemn as he was able, while the young man clambered up out of the hole.

"Can you drink some water for me?"

Ranma wasn't sure why he'd be doing this for the stranger. He badly wanted that water. "Yes, please."

The young man withdrew to a pack on the ground and, after rummaging through it for a moment, produced a canteen.

Ranma's eyes followed it greedily. It made an amazing sound as the stranger withdrew it: a metal-on-liquid swishy noise that was very enticing.

"Listen to me, Ranma," the young man said in the commanding sort of voice that drew Ranma's eyes to his. "You're going to have to take just one, tiny sip. Can you do that?"

Ranma puffed out his chest. Another test! No wonder the stranger had phrased his question about water that way. But this was really easy, not like the last one. He nodded. "Yessir."

"That's good. Here you go."

On second thought, it was tougher than Ranma would have thought to lower the canteen after one, tiny sip, but he managed.

"Very good," the young man praised him. He rummaged through the pack again and found something that sounded like wind through fall leaves – a package of rice crackers, Ranma realized, mouth watering. The young man broke off a tiny piece of cracker and handed it to Ranma. "Chew slowly. Then take another small sip of water."

Ranma did both of these. Then his tummy jumped unexpectedly, and he pushed both away.

"That's all right," the young man said. He didn't sound but so disappointed with Ranma, so maybe it was. "We'll try that again later." He found a bowl and tipped a small amount of the water inside. "For your kitten," he explained, reaching out.

Ranma was surprised to find he'd clutched the kitten closer than ever. He didn't really think the young man was after his kitten. The stranger had been super-nice so far, nicer than almost anybody Ranma'd ever met. But somehow he couldn't seem to make himself let go.

"It's all right, sweetheart," the young man said, and Ranma's gaze jerked up to meet his own. There it was again, that _sweetheart_, as though Ranma were – well, maybe not a girl, maybe that wasn't right. But it sounded strangely personal, like the stranger thought he was really something special.

The stranger pried at each of Ranma's fingers individually, and the kitten dashed away.

For a moment, a tightness clutched at Ranma's throat and he felt a hot prickling behind his eyes. But then he saw that his kitten had run for the nearest bush. The kitten was probably just as thirsty and hungry as Ranma, but was too frightened to stay out in the open.

The stranger gestured to Ranma and together they crept a bit away from the water. They lay flat on the ground, quiet as mice, and eventually the kitten came creeping forward. Eventually it dashed for the water. Ranma would have stood up, but the young man put a cautioning hand out. Ranma and the young man watched the kitten lap at the water until its tiny shoulders eased a bit. The young man took a bit of cracker and handed it to Ranma, who broke off a piece.

The kitten's head snapped up at the noise, and Ranma could see her small, pink nose work. Maybe cats didn't normally like cracker, because when Ranma offered it to her she licked at it with one pink tongue and made a face. But apparently beggars couldn't be choosers, and the kitten had soon crunched through an entire cracker and was peaceably seated on Ranma's lap and begging for more.

"See?" the young man said, with a strange smile. "She's going to be okay."

"Mmm," said Ranma neutrally, but on the inside he was delighted at the progress he'd made with the kitten, and in a sort of cautious awe at the way the stranger had handled her. The kitten now seemed perfectly content to crawl all over the young man's trousers as he sat; she also apparently enjoyed gnawing at his fingers. Ranma's daddy had told him not to talk to strangers, and a stranger calling him _sweetheart_ reminded him of those strange places with red lanterns daddy told him to walk through _really fast_. But Ranma decided then and there that someone who knew how to handle a kitten couldn't really be all bad. "My daddy would like you," he proclaimed.

"Is that so?"

Ranma wasn't sure why the young man said this through lips that seemed that they barely moved, upper and lower teeth pressed together. So, "yeah!" he exclaimed, taking another tiny sip from the canteen under the stranger's watchful eye. "Wait 'til you meet him!"

The young man frowned. "We can't wait here for him."

Ranma's eyes widened. "Why not?"

"He's been gone awhile, hasn't he?"

Ranma paused, thinking on this. "He did say he'd be back sooner. But he says that a lot, so that's okay. He wants me to be a Man Amongst Men!"

"I'm sure he does."

There it was, that teeth-clenchy thing that looked awfully uncomfortable. Ranma took a tiny bite of cracker, chewed carefully, and swallowed. "He's gonna come for me, an' then you can meet him," he went on.

"I don't think so," the stranger said, and for the first time Ranma began to worry.

"You won't take me away from my daddy!"

The young man paused. "What's your name?" he finally asked.

"Saotome. Saotome Ranma."

"That's a good name," the young man said. "I'm Hibiki Ryoga." He paused again, this time for longer. But the look on his face said that there was more he wanted to say, so Ranma kept looking up at him. "So we're not strangers anymore, all right?"

Ranma frowned at this thought. They'd eaten together, and Hibiki Ryoga had gotten rid of the cats and helped him up out of the hole and taught him how to feed his kitten. So this was true: they were no longer strangers.

"And Ranma, I need to have a look at those cuts. They've got to be disinfected –"

"Nooooo!" Ranma wailed dramatically.

Hibiki Ryoga leaned forward and tapped the side of Ranma's nose. "Your daddy already taught you, didn't he – that sometimes you have to hurt a little bit to feel better in the long run?"

"Like with the cats?"

Hibiki Ryoga's features crumpled for a minute. "Not like that, Ranma. Like – when you stretch a muscle and it hurts at first, but then that means you don't cramp it up, later. Disinfecting the cuts is like that. Hurts at first, but you won't get an infection, later."

Ranma blinked. Grown-ups didn't usually talk to him like that. In fact, that was the most complicated explanation he'd ever received, for anything.

"It's not just the cuts, though. After your stomach settles a bit more, you need to eat to stay healthy. And then you need to sleep – all the way through the night. We can't do any of those three things here. We can't wait for your father to come."

Ranma's eyes widened. This was unacceptable, the idea that he might miss his father – that his father might believe he'd abandoned the quest to become a Man Amongst Men. That he'd never see his father again… "No!" he shouted, pushing the young man away.

Hibiki Ryoga didn't look surprised, but a faint line of worry did appear in between his dark eyebrows. "Sorry, Ranma. Hey, I've got an idea. What if we leave a note for your father saying where you've gone? That way he can follow us when he comes around again." He withdrew some paper and ink from his pack and scribbled words that even Ranma recognized – _Saotome Ranma has gone to stay with Hibiki Ryoga at the Tendo Dojo – _and dropped it in the pit. Ranma figured it could only blow around so much, and wouldn't escape the pit's confines.

Ranma thought this sounded sensible for a moment, but then he shook his head. "I can't leave; my daddy will be here any minute…"

"Here's the thing, Ranma," Hibiki Ryoga said, leaning in very close. And now Ranma saw that he had big eyes and they were very green and very kind. "I can't leave you here because you're pretty beat up, and not just for a kid – for anybody, you see. And I'm not the kind of guy that could leave someone looking this bad."

" 'M fine!"

Hibiki-san rolled his eyes and grinned. "Sure thing! But I'm going to take you to someone who will have better luck at making sure. Come on, now, this isn't a request." He extended one hand and looked meaningfully towards Ranma.

Ranma scooped up the kitten. "Can I take kitty with me?"

"Yes, the kitten can come along. Now, you're going to have to get a good grip on her; there you go, that's good. And I'm going to have to get a good grip on you. Now, you mustn't be alarmed, but I travel a lot faster than most people."

Ranma was surprised to be swept up into Hibiki-san's arms again, kitten and all. He'd thought that was a one-time thing to help him out of the pit, and he hadn't minded it then because he felt so weak. Still did, really, but the water and crackers had made him feel a bit more human again. "I can walk on my own," he tested.

"I figure you can," Hibiki Ryoga said, clutching him all the tighter, "but this is always a little bumpy. We're going to travel a special way now, and I don't want you to be scared."

"I ain't scared of nothin'," said Ranma.

"Really? That's pretty impressive; I'm scared of lots of things," Hibiki Ryoga said. "Now hold on tight."

Ranma did.

* * *

A/N: Well. This story is going to kind of be like a Choose-Your-Own-Adventure, because I'm really** depending on readers to tell me what they would like to happen**, next. I have so many different ideas for how this story could work, and I just started getting bogged down in them. So! I had a let-the-readers-decide moment. I'm aware I'll probably only get responses from author subscribers for the first few chapters, but that's okay. It'll be nice to hear from you guys again. :)

Moreover, I think it'd be a fun challenge to write to someone else's specifications rather than my own.

This is **not going to be a true Choose-Your-Own-Adventure**; I'm not writing out the results of every suggestion, just the one that I think I'll be able to write the most entertainingly. I'd try for a real CYOA, but for some reason they're not allowed on ff-dot-net? Ah, well.

The central question for the next bit is: **who is Ryoga?** Why is he so much older than Ranma, here? Yes, he has the power to consciously travel, but that does not necessarily mean he is HM's Ryoga... though that's one of the possibilities. He could also be a Ryoga who just discovered his abilities, or a Ryoga well into his powers... I made his description purposely vague so that all you get is that he's significantly older than Ranma and knows where the Tendo Dojo is and that Ranma belongs there.

So - ideas?

Thanks for helping me out! I think this could be a lot of fun. :D

-Kirinin


	2. Healer

Chapter Two: Healer

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When Ranma opened his eyes, the first thing he noticed was that there were a lot of people around – people walking, people shouting to each other, three teenagers play-wrestling. But they weren't regular people: their hair was dyed strange colors, from purple to peony-red to midnight-blue; and they wore nicer things than most of the people in the villages Ranma had visited with his daddy. Ranma would have clambered down to examine his new surroundings, but of course he had his kitten to protect.

In that case, it was perfectly all right to squirm a little bit closer to Hibiki Ryoga, keeping anything but the kitten's tiny head from poking up between them.

Hibiki-san drew back a bit to look at Ranma. "Hey," he said. "You did pretty well with that."

Ranma had known the stranger was a sorcerer already: instant travel certainly wasn't any scarier than seeing a rock collapse when Hibiki Ryoga touched it.

Although it _was_ a bit cooler. With the blue light and the whole here-one-moment, gone-the-next thing.

When some of the women around the village began giving them strange looks, Hibiki-san put Ranma down for a moment. "Listen carefully, Ranma, all right? There is a healer – a doctor," he corrected when Ranma's brow scrunched, "who can make sure you're going to be all right. But you'll have to stay very quiet for me, and only answer when I give you the nod, like this." The young man jerked his head down, once. "Otherwise, you don't say a word."

Ranma read him loud and clear: this doctor was a scary person, and Hibiki-san was afraid of what he might do. "Yessir," he replied.

"Good. That's good." Hibiki Ryoga reached out and ruffled Ranma's hair, gently. "All right, then." He reached out his hand; after a moment Ranma realized what he wanted and grasped it.

Together they made for the center of the village. Hibiki-san talked to a few of the women, but most seemed disinterested, and a few looked a little _too _interested and made Hibiki-san nervous. He usually broke off conversation with these women quickly.

Finally, a woman with forest-green hair and brown eyes approached them. When she smiled, the sides of her eyes crinkled up; they were crinkled up, now. Ranma liked her on sight. "Hello," she said to Ryoga in lightly accented Japanese. Her eyes lit on Ranma. "Hello little one."

Ranma wanted to protest that he wasn't little, he was a big boy. However, Hibiki-san hadn't nodded at him, so he kept silent. He was very proud of himself; his daddy told him to be quiet very often, and he was seldom so good at remembering to do so. Maybe the cats had helped make him a Man Amongst Men after all.

"My name is Hibiki Ryoga, I am searching for Cologne," Ryoga said. "This child needs a healer, and I think she might be able to help."

"I am Wan Da," the woman replied with a small bow. "Is he your brother?"

"Yes," Hibiki-san said. "His name is Ranma."

Wan Da knelt until she was at Ranma's eye level. "Hello, Ranma."

Ranma looked up at Hibiki Ryoga, who gave him a subtle nod.

"Hello, Wan-san."

"What's the matter, dear?" she inquired.

"I – I got cut," Ranma replied. "From – " He squeezed the kitty a bit. "Some cats."

"I'm afraid they'll infect," Hibiki Ryoga said, brow furrowed. "And I'd like to make sure he's not hurt – anyplace else."

"I see," Wan Da said, oddly slowly. Her eyes skittered back and forth like she was thinking hard, and the way she'd answered so slow made Ranma think that what she saw was a lot more than Ranma had told her. Suddenly her kind eyes made Ranma a little nervous. A few times when Ranma had played up his urchin status to score free food, women with eyes like Wan Da's had urged him to stay with them, and he and his daddy had to run away in the night.

"My father is coming for me soon," Ranma interjected in sudden inspiration. "He's going to meet us at the Tendo Dojo."

"Well, we'd best hurry then, so you don't miss him," Wan Da replied cheerily, pushing against her knees to level herself upright. "Let's see if we can't find the Elder."

Ryoga didn't scoop Ranma up again, but he offered his hand palm up, and this time Ranma knew to angle his smaller one to meet it. By and by they came upon a small cottage, and to Ranma's trained eye it was a lot like the rest of the village: surprisingly prosperous for a small, out-of-the-way Chinese town nestled in the mountains. A variety of wild but attractive plants had been planted out front: Ranma recognized a few as being good to eat, though he didn't know their names. Some climbing vines had made a home around the window and were fragrant with blossoms. A yoke for carrying water stood abandoned in the front, with empty buckets on either side.

Wan Da rapped swiftly on the front door, then stuck her head in without waiting for a reply. "Elder? Guests," she said simply, then gestured them through.

Inside, the hut was just as full of sensible clutter as the outside. When Ranma looked up, he could see dead leaves hanging from the ceiling in bunches above an indoor water-pump and pot-bellied stove, along with some withered roots.

"Those are for cooking, and for medicine," Wan Da explained, following his gaze.

Immediately, a cat emerged from the back of the hut to wind about Wan Da's legs. The kitten mewed piteously, and Ranma set her down, surprised at how empty his arms felt in the absence of the kitten's warmth. The two cats circled each other before the older one began licking the kitten. Ranma, fascinated, knelt down beside them. Maybe he'd been right, and the cats in the pit were as frightened as he'd been, and even hungrier. Maybe they hadn't liked eating – what they had – but maybe they'd had no choice.

Ranma shuddered all over when he remembered the half-devoured corpse, and he jumped and whirled when Hibiki-san wrapped a warm hand around his shoulder.

For the first time, Ranma realized that something was wrong. He had an unsettled feeling in his tummy that hadn't let up since the pit, and now it was churning worse than ever. He was shaking and couldn't stop, even though he wasn't cold; and his heart thumped in his chest like he was with the cats in the dark all over again, even though he was safe here with Hibiki Ryoga and Wan Da and his kitten.

Ryoga knelt beside Ranma, hands open on his upper thighs. "Ranma, when you're ready, I want you to come here," he said, and then waited.

In between breaths, Ranma berated himself: stupid, stupid, _stupid_. Why couldn't he just calm down? He _knew_ there were no cats anymore, at least no cats that were hungry and frightened enough to hurt him! The kitten would never claw at him, and Ryoga would protect him from anything else that might try. But somehow it still took a long time before Ranma could breathe normally. When he could gasp forth a more even breath and blink away the tears standing in his eyes, he approached Ryoga, who put out both hands and clasped Ranma to him.

"All right, now," he said, into Ranma's ear. "It's over. You know it's over, Ranma…"

And Ranma knew that, except for where he didn't.

"You're all right, and no one – " Hibiki-san's voice cracked a bit, and he stopped speaking for a moment. "No one is going to put you down there again."

This was an empty reassurance, Ranma knew. His daddy wanted him to be a Man Amongst Men, and would stop at nothing to reach that goal, including testing him some more. The pit hadn't worked, so maybe he'd done something wrong and would have to try it again… or perhaps an even more desperate technique in order to make sure Ranma reached Manhood.

But no matter what his daddy did, the possibility of Ranma _ever_ becoming a Man Amongst Men was looking bleak. He wanted to bawl into Hibiki Ryoga's shirt, then go to sleep for a week; and he knew enough about being a Man Amongst Men to know that Real Men weren't scared of anything; a Real Man would have come out of that pit stronger, wilder, more like a cat himself.

Maybe he was such a baby – such a little _girl_ – that even a technique _guaranteed_ to produce a Man Amongst Men could only make him weaker.

Such were Ranma's thoughts as he clung, empty-eyed, to Ryoga's shirt.

Ranma heard a funny rumbling noise behind him, but it was only when a voice interjected, "you'll have to actually _let go of him_, Hibiki, if you want me to have a look at him," that he realized the Healer had arrived.

The Healer was tiny, and that was what Ranma noted, first: he came up to her shoulder, which made her the shortest grown-up he'd ever seen. Next, he realized she was a woman; he'd thought doctors were men, but maybe that wasn't true with healers. Finally, he noticed she had the most complicated expression on her face he'd ever seen, and that he didn't have a hope of figuring out what she was thinking.

"Hello, Ranma," said the Healer. "My name is Cologne."

Or at least, that was how her name sounded to Ranma. He wondered if her name meant 'agreeable' or 'old mountain'. He figured he'd have to know her better before he knew which.

"Hello, Cologne-sama," Ranma said, because Cologne was the oldest lady he'd ever met, and his momma had taught him to respect his elders. Someone this much older had to deserve even more respect than Sanai-san next door, who was only sixty.

For the first time in months, Ranma missed his mother with a sharp pang like the blade of a knife sliding through his solar plexus: another sign he was never going to become a Man Amongst Men. A Man Amongst Men didn't miss his momma – he wasn't even sure a real man _had_ a momma, or if he did, he didn't think about her, much.

"Now, I hear you've been injured, hmm?"

"S'not bad," he replied stubbornly.

"Climb under the sheet here, and then take off your shirt."

Ranma noticed for the first time that Ryoga had carried him a bit further into the hut when he'd started to feel… funny, where a small cot rested beneath a window. He dutifully climbed under the light blanket and stripped off his clothing, which he had to admit stank terribly. He dropped the pile of malodorous clothes off the edge of the cot like a dead thing.

Cologne tsked under her breath as she examined the cuts. "So many! Could this be the result of the Cat Fist training?"

Ranma nodded.

In a swift and therefore surprising move, Elder Cologne swung her staff through the air and used it to crack Hibiki Ryoga in the back of the head.

"Ow! _I _didn't throw him in there!"

Ryoga looked entirely unharmed, so Ranma thought it was safe enough to giggle.

"Well then. I don't suppose you're his real brother, either."

Ryoga began to babble a denial.

"Sorry sonny, but you have to get up pretty early in the morning to fool this old broad," Cologne chuckled. "You handle the child more like a parent."

The young man paled at this, but reached out blindly to clutch at Ranma's hand. Ranma looked up at him and squeezed that hand, feeling like he was comforting the grown-up for once instead of the other way around. "Ryoga-san is going to take care of me until we reach the Tendo Dojo," he said, firmly – just in case this Elder Cologne got any ideas.

Ryoga throwing him a grateful look filled Ranma's tummy with warmth. For the first time in what seemed like a long time, he'd gotten something just right.

"I'm not taking the child away from you," Elder Cologne said lowly. "But I had to be sure about you. Where did you find him?"

"In the pit," Ryoga explained, and went on to say how he believed Ranma had been there for days.

Cologne's darkening expression frightened Ranma, but then Ryoga looked about the same. He couldn't help but feel like he'd failed somehow in the pit, but even in his anxious state he recognized that their anger wasn't for him.

"You shouldn't be mad," he interrupted, when Ryoga's fists had begun to clench, and Elder Cologne had begun to look as though she were going to lay about with that stick left and right. "The cats didn't mean it."

When the two adults stared, he felt he had to continue, to make them understand:

"They were tired and hungry and they didn't know why someone had put them down there."

Ryoga stared at him a moment longer, and his strained expression was impossible for Ranma to read. With one last, desperate glance, he turned away and left through the front door, very quickly.

"R-Ryoga!" Ranma shouted, then quieted immediately. The desperate sound of his voice had shocked and shamed him.

"It's all right," Cologne told him. "He will be back when he's mastered himself."

Ranma wasn't sure what that meant, and it must've showed.

"Your Hibiki Ryoga is a very bright, very responsible young man. And a man of high emotion. I believe he is putting himself in your place, feeling what you feel. He is angry, but not _at _you. Rather, on your behalf."

"He's angry I was put in the pit?"

"That's right."

"But it was important."

"Why is that?" Cologne seemed interested in what Ranma had to say, so he forgot his promise to Ryoga.

"My father wants me to be a good martial artist," he said carefully, because even when Ranma was effusive, he remembered that the Man Amongst Men thing was their family secret.

"Your father put you in the pit, Ranma?"

Ranma nodded, but slowly. He knew Elder Cologne and Hibiki Ryoga disapproved of the pit; he was young, not stupid. Now two schools of thought were warring in his mind. Part of Ranma was saying, _Daddy said it would make me strong!_ The other part was speaking in a dark, whispery, doubty voice: _but it made you weaker, instead. It made one of the kitties starve. It made the other kitties eat him. It was bad._

"So long as your Ryoga didn't."

"No!" Ranma exclaimed. "Ryoga wouldn't ever –!" He paused, brought up short.

What Ranma's daddy had done, Ryoga would never do. Ranma was struck by his certainty, because in general he found he was wary of strangers; but somehow Ryoga was different. When he looked at Ryoga, a voice deep inside said _trusthim!trusthim!_ and so Ranma did; he couldn't seem to help it. And now that same voice said with such conviction that _Ryoga wouldn't ever_.

Cologne let him think this over without saying much, cleaning out Ranma's cuts. Sometimes she had to scrub, if there was dirt, or if they were scabbed over, and that hurt, distracting Ranma from this new conundrum. After a little while, a tiny figure darted through the hut and tugged at the edges of Cologne's robes.

Ranma peered over the edge of the cot to see a girl about his age wearing a grey-green shift, her lavender hair done up in a pigtail atop her head. She looked up at Ranma and stuck out her tongue.

"Great-grandma is busy just now," Cologne told her.

The tiny figure stomped her foot.

"Spoiled," Cologne proclaimed her.

"Wanna play!" the girl growled.

"Well, you can play with Ranma here, once he's patched up."

"Did you fall into brier patch?" she queried – scornfully.

"Ranma's hurts are quite none of your business," Cologne went on, tending to a large scrape on Ranma's side. "Oh, dear. Shampoo, please fetch Wan Da. This will need to be stitched up."

"Stitches?" Ranma inquired, with wide eyes.

"Just a few, to make sure you won't have a scar."

"I like scars!"

"…and to make sure it doesn't infect."

Ranma subsided, sulkily. He knew what it was like to have a cut infect and cause fever. He had hazy memories of his father's panicked face as they entered the clinic in Shanghai.

Wan Da returned, and put a paste onto Ranma's skin that made it buzz unpleasantly; shortly thereafter, the feeling disappeared altogether. When Wan Da prodded it with her finger, Ranma had the vague and hazy sensation that something was touching him, but no pain.

Cologne's fingers were deft as she stitched up Ranma's side. Ranma could only watch the needle slide through his skin with horrified fascination. It didn't hurt at all, but it looked ghastly.

Cologne finished cleaning him up and then appraised him. "You'll need to go to the stream and wash yourself all over," she said. "Shampoo!"

Shampoo appeared at her grandmother's side, still looking a bit resentful. Her lower lip jutted out.

"Show Ranma the bathing stream." She handed the lavender-haired girl what looked like a rock, as well as a strip of cloth. "Wan Da will be collecting water-mint, so she should be within shouting distance," she added.

Something in her tone of voice made Ranma turn to stare at her. He wasn't sure if what Cologne-sama had said was a reassurance – or a warning.

"Come on!" Shampoo ordered, and took off out of the hut at a run.

Cologne wrapped the light blanket around his shoulders and tied it in a complicated knot so that it would stay put. "Slower, Shampoo! Ranma's injured," she shouted, then sighed. "That girl..."

* * *

A/N: First of all thanks to everyone who reviewed last time! I appreciated everyone's ideas.

Everyone decided time travel was what was going on... but, erm, yes. I sort of supposed everyone'd think so to begin with. I was pretty amazed when someone said, oh-so-cleverly that Ranma wasn't actually a child, but Ryoga was playing along for some reason. Whoa, you guys are super-creative! The mushrooms in canon immediately came to mind... too bad a de-aging story isn't really where I wanted to go, because that would have been a pretty cool idea. Feel free to steal it...

**Kizmet** offered up the thought that Ranma isn't the Ranma we know, but Ranma's son... who is treated at *least* as poorly as Genma treated him. Which was really really creepy and also pretty darned awesome. If I wrote dark!fic I might've snatched that one right up.

**Oberron **made the point that while Ranma might *think* of his father as 'daddy', he would probably call him 'father' aloud, which is a good call. **Sanaro0** suggested that Ryoga might take Ranma on a more sane training trip and mentioned Amazon techniques.

And that is how we ended up here.

So: the next question is this. **Do Shampoo and Ranma get along at first, or do they argue? **It matters to the plot... big-time, in this case. Feel free to shoot out anything else that occurs to you as well, but that's what I'm mainly focused on in this round.

Oh. I figure someone'll ask why Shampoo already speaks Japanese. Frankly, I'm not sure why she _doesn't _speak Japanese in the anime/manga, other than that her pidgin Japanese is perceived as 'cute', and serves as a source of additional confusion/complication at the beginning of her story arc. Cologne speaks Japanese; Mousse, a peer of hers, also speaks Japanese. I'd say that Mousse, in order to learn to speak another language that well, probably started young. Why Shampoo didn't do so as well is a mystery to me. So in this world, Mousse and Shampoo started learning Japanese when they were little, prodded along by Wan Da, who sees these things as Very Important.


	3. Spirit

Chapter Three: Spirit

* * *

"How you get hurt, anyhow?" Shampoo asked, pushing some underbrush out of her way.

Ranma shrugged. With the way that Ryoga and Cologne-sama had reacted, he wasn't sure he wanted to tell the girl. Still, Shampoo was beginning to look a little bit more irritated. "Some animals," he finally said.

"What kind animal?"

"What kind _of_ animal?" Ranma corrected, because her Japanese was beginning to bother him. His momma had taught him how to speak politely, and he thought it was sad that this girl didn't know how. It was much more important for girls than boys, too.

"What kind _of _animal," Shampoo repeated gamely, with such exact inflection that Ranma wondered if she'd even understood why he'd corrected her.

He kicked at a stone in his path as they emerged from the underbrush to reach a gently-flowing stream. "Cats," he finally said.

"Mountain-cat?"

"No. _Cat_. _Kitty_."

Shampoo's eyebrows raised, and after a moment she made a high-pitched mewing sound, then looked to Ranma for confirmation.

"… yeah."

Shampoo dissolved into laughter, hands on knees. When Ranma glared at her, she made a few mewing noises and some helpless clawing motions with one hand.

Ranma could feel his face turning a bright red. "You're just stupid!" he shouted. "Too stupid to talk right, and too stupid to understand! You're just a stupid, stupid – _girl_!"

"Smart enough to speak too too good Japanese!" she shouted back, stung. "And you? How good your Mandarin?"

"Good enough!" Ranma shouted back. He cleared his throat. "_Where is the bathroom_?" he asked.

Shampoo stared at him for a beat, then dissolved into laughter again.

Ranma couldn't help it – suddenly he was seeing the funny side, too. "I can say lots of things," he added with the beginnings of a grin. "_Salt – pepper – pork – _"

"You plan only eat and piss in China!" Shampoo said.

Ranma had never heard anyone his age curse before, and he found himself equal parts shocked and intrigued. Then, a burst of laughter emerged, surprising him. It made his still-tingling side hurt, so he stopped quickly, but there it was.

"I like you, Ranma. You very very funny," Shampoo said peaceably.

Ranma felt somehow as though he'd mastered a new technique. "So are you."

"Yes," Shampoo agreed.

Together, they scrubbed Ranma free of grime. Normally, Ranma hated baths, but there was something about the cool water on a hot day, even when Shampoo insisted on washing and brushing his hair as well.

"Where you _been_?" she demanded at one point, teasing burrs and seeds from his hair. "You _filthy_."

"I'm going to be the best martial artist ever," Ranma shot back. "You can't do that in boring old Japan."

"_I'm _going to be the best martial artist ever," Shampoo countered, worrying at an especially challenging knot, "and I do it _right here._"

Ranma pondered on that for a minute. "But how? You can't fight as many people."

"But that okay," Shampoo said, finally finished brushing Ranma's hair. "All best fighters here. No one beat great-grandmother."

Ranma didn't say anything to that, though it was clear from Shampoo's expression that she expected him to protest: _surely not!_ But Ranma had seen how swiftly Cologne-sama had struck Ryoga, and with great strength. He had a suspicion that betting against the old lady in a fight would be what his daddy called a 'sucker's bet'.

Shampoo rubbed her hands with soap and attacked Ranma's scalp. "Too too good fighters come here all time," she went on helpfully, "trying to learn new – new – " She paused. "Things," was her eventual compromise. "Under!" was the only warning she gave before dunking Ranma beneath the chilly water.

Ranma came up coughing and sputtering to glare at her. For the first time, he felt like he understood Cologne's warning. Shampoo's face made her look his age, but she was taller than he was, and very strong. He had the creeping feeling that if she'd wanted to hold him under water and _keep_ him there, she wouldn't have had much of a problem.

Ranma sat awfully quiet while Shampoo finished up by combing some kind of slimy stuff in his hair and rinsed it again, a bit more gently this time.

"…so," he said once he was on shore again with a soft cloth wrapped around his waist. "You fight, right?"

Shampoo looked at him like this was a very stupid question. "Best in age group," she said.

"Even the boys?" Ranma wanted to know.

The purple-haired girl's expression turned patient, as though she found Ranma excessively slow. "Men in village not fight."

Ranma frowned. He was sure he'd seen two young men sparring with sticks on the way through the village, so this could not be entirely so. He dried out his hair and slipped into the loose, knee-length tunic Cologne had provided. " 'Course they do, Shampoo," he protested. "But I guess they don't fight with you." Maybe the boys their age were even _better_ than Shampoo, but she'd never know 'cause they were too manly to fight her; that made sense, even if it was a little disheartening, even if it made his prospects of manhood seem bleaker than ever. But after all, that was why he and his daddy traveled: to learn new things. Maybe he could study with some of the boys here. Maybe there was hope, yet.

"No, Shampoo is too young to fight with boys," she replied with a frown.

Ranma shook his head in amazement. "Older girls fight with boys?"

She nodded. "Of course. Shampoo is not ready for marriage."

This didn't really parse to Ranma. What did marriage have to do with fighting? But he had to admit, there were a lot of things he didn't know about girls and boys and what they did together; and when he asked questions about those things, his daddy turned sort of red and mumbled something about cabbages, so he stopped asking. He remembered his mother telling him a fairy story about a bird bringing a child "when a manly man and his devoted wife love each other very, very much" – but even he knew this was a lie, even if it was a kind of neat one. He sort of liked the idea of being wrapped in a blanketed bundle and soaring over the clouds, but best of all he liked to think of how happy and surprised his momma had been when she found him out on her stoop.

Ranma tried to get his mind back on track while Shampoo led the charge back through the underbrush and towards the village proper. "But so you don't know if you're better than any of the boys," he pressed. "They could be better 'n you. An' you'd never know."

Shampoo paused while she worked this out, both in speech and in step, one hand outstretched and parting the reeds before her; but then she shook her head. "But they _boys_," she emphasized, as though that answered the question entirely.

Ranma trotted after her. "Yeah, so naturally they'd be better."

The little girl whirled, bringing Ranma up short. "_Boys_ better at fighting?" she scoffed.

"Yeah! Girls are weak and stupid and a distraction to the art!"

Ranma gulped when Shampoo's eyes flashed as though he'd lit an inferno behind them. For a girl, she sure was scary.

"_Boys_ weak and stupid!" she shot back. "Boys are only good for keeping house and giving woman babies!"

This was Ranma's world turned on its head. All he could think was that Shampoo had been lied to, or had misunderstood a fundamental tenet of the universe's workings. "No," he explained, with a bit more patience this time in light of Shampoo's plain _wrongness_. "Boys are stronger. That's what _girls_ are good for!"

Shampoo turned bright red. "You _wrong_!" she shouted.

Ranma folded his arms, unable to believe that Shampoo was unwilling to move on something so obvious. "No," he said, "_you're_ wrong."

Shampoo growled and leapt for Ranma.

Ranma wasn't stupid. He evaded, and quickly as he could, aware of the ten or so pounds the bigger girl had on him. Shampoo's attack missed, but not by much. "See?" he said, with more than a hint of desperation, "you can't even _catch_ me, so how could you beat me?" And he raced off.

Ranma's bare feet were pretty rough from tromping through the mountains in whatever shoes he and his father could find cheap, so the branches and vines that might have broken the skin on another child barely stung him as he shot through wooded clearings, up and down over hills. He was feeling a lot better than he'd felt in Elder Cologne's cottage, able to expend all that pent-up energy that hadn't seemed like it wanted to leave. He released a wild laugh as he bounded forward. "Can't catch me!" he taunted. "Waaay too slow!"

Unfortunately, Shampoo _was_ the best in her age group and Ranma was tireder than he'd thought. She soon caught up with him and aimed a kick at his midsection which Ranma barely dodged.

Ranma gasped as Shampoo's ankle _whistled_ in front of his face. She wasn't play-fighting! Maybe the women here were special somehow – different from Japanese women, who lived to cook, arrange flowers, and please their husbands – because Shampoo was the best girl fighter he'd ever seen, and then some. It took all he had to evade her grasp.

Most people got sloppy when angry, or at least sloppier. Not Shampoo. The more Ranma danced around her attacks and expressed displeasure at the idea of hurting a girl, the faster and more deadly she became. Shampoo was clearly one of those rare fighters who became _more _coordinated and deadly the more Ranma taunted her, so eventually he became silent.

"I'll prove it's girls who are best!" Shampoo shouted. "Kachuu Tenshin Amaguriken!"

Once, on a serene autumn day, Ranma was traveling a slender path up a mountainside on his daddy's shoulders when they inadvertently surprised a flock of tiny, brightly colored birds as they rounded a natural curve in the rock; and the creatures, surprised, darted towards them, banging into Ranma repeatedly.

'Kachuu Tenshin Amaguriken' felt _exactly like that_: painful, startling, and unremitting_._

Ranma stumbled backward and fell, hard, on his butt. His entire _being_ ached, so that he wondered what it was that Shampoo had just done.

On any other day, Ranma would have taken his defeat cheerfully. He knew, at least intellectually, that it was hard to beat an opponent who was taller and faster than he was, and that this meant he had to train harder in order to win. It certainly wasn't the first time he'd landed butt-first onto the ground in pursuit of the Art.

But this wasn't any other day. Ranma looked up into Shampoo's self-satisfied smirk and saw his entire day played out in his mind's eye – saw the trouble his daddy had gone to in order to make him a real Man Amongst Men. The failure of the technique stung – he'd learned nothing – and he'd needed rescuing in the end, just like a little girl. And now here was this _girl_, this _nothing_, telling him boys were weak and stupid and she'd defeated him with a move _too fast to see_.

Ranma flipped to his feet. "I ain't losing to some stupid _girl_!" he shouted.

Shampoo, whose expression had begun to soften, growled, "…catch me if _can_, dumb _boy_!" and darted forward.

Now it was Ranma who gave chase, darting in and out of the dappled sunlight. His fatigue belonged to some other boy; his hurts were immaterial. All that mattered was salvaging something of this horrible day; all that mattered was proving once and for all that _he_ mattered, that he was what his daddy wanted him to be: a Man Amongst Men.

Shampoo hadn't gotten any slower; she was still faster than he, and ran before him like a nymph, familiar and at home in woods that were strange to Ranma. He lost her in minutes, but he did not want to admit it to himself, and so continued searching as the shadows lengthened. Occasionally he thought he heard her, and he would head in that direction for awhile; but either Shampoo was leading him a merry chase or he was off in search of raccoons and squirrels leaping through the brush.

Eventually, Ranma came upon a welcoming clearing after his long run. He'd finally come to the conclusion that Shampoo was long gone, and saw no harm in sitting in the shade for a bit, maybe having a drink of water to console himself. He slid down the tiny slope that led into a verdant valley, surrounded by bamboo. Ranma had learned his father's lessons well: where there was bamboo, there was fresh water.

He crept carefully, just in case he was trespassing on anybody's land. He knew from hard-won experience that the more lovely an area, the more likely it was that someone wanted to claim it, whether it truly belonged to them or not. And this place certainly was lovely, with its shimmering pools and its play of light and shade.

It was an interesting enough spot that soon enough Ranma's curiosity overcame his fear. There were dozens if not hundreds of tiny pools, all misty and sparkling oddly in the half-light. Ranma wandered from one to the other, peering into each as he went.

It was strange: he was thirsty, but he couldn't make himself sip from a single pool, though they all looked clear and curiously compelling. Maybe it was all those warnings from his daddy about standing water, but many were large enough for Ranma to swim in, and all were clear as glass.

Finally, he grew tired and sat by one of the deeper pools. It didn't feel like the others, all _calling_…

Ranma paused. If he slid out of focus in just the right way, he could almost _hear_ the water of the other pools asking him to jump in. He backed up in shocked fear until he came up on a grown-up's legs behind him, and whirled.

Behind him stood perhaps the prettiest lady Ranma had ever seen. She reached out with hands as swift as Shampoo's and steadied him.

"Easy, there," she told him. "You wouldn't want to fall in."

"No!" Ranma exclaimed.

She cocked her head to one side. "You can hear the water?"

Ranma's head bobbed frantically.

"Good boy," she said, slowly, like she had to think about it.

Ranma wondered if she'd mistaken him for a girl at first; it wouldn't be the first time.

The woman reached out slender fingers for Ranma's hands, and he realized he'd been unconsciously fingering his dark hair. He couldn't count the number of times he'd begged for it to be lopped off, but his father had sworn that young men wore pigtails too.

"Are you all right?" she asked him.

Ranma scarcely knew what to tell her. He would have liked to tell her anything she wanted to know. But he himself wasn't sure about the answer to her question. All he knew was that he wanted to be home, but he wasn't sure where home was, anymore: in Japan, with his mother; on the road, with his father; or… with someone else.

She sat down on the turf and patted next to her until he sunk to his knees. "It's better not to stand, here," she advised. "The water has ways of tipping people in."

Ranma turned shocked eyes on her, and she nodded.

"Each of these pools is cursed," she told him, "by the last thing to drown here."

"Something's drowned in _every_ pool?" Ranma gulped.

She laughed. "No. But the empty ones are hungry for something to possess them. No one knows why."

Ranma shuddered. "How did I end up here?"

The woman's features grew thoughtful. "It's hard to say," she replied. "Spirits that go into the Jusenkyo pools sometimes hide their location, sometimes reveal it. Put another way, I guess you're meant to be here."

Ranma felt afraid. "I want Ryoga," he heard himself saying, with a distant embarrassment.

"Ryoga? Really!" she exclaimed.

"He's taking care of me until Daddy comes to the Tendo Dojo. You know Ryoga?"

She grinned a bit wickedly. "For awhile I knew him, yes. Although that's a little hard to keep track of. The spirits here are timeless, everything is simultaneous. It was very hard to get used to, at first, all things happening at once."

"Wait a minute…" Ranma stammered. "You're a spirit!"

She smiled. "We aren't all able to be corporeal – er – that is, able to interact with real things? But my spring carries not just my form but also _who I am_, and so I am here, and able to prevent you from falling into a lifetime of carrying my face and myself."

He hadn't forgotten that she'd saved him, not really. His runner's stance was just because he was stretching his legs. "Why did you stop me? Don't all the spirits want people to fall in?"

"Normally," she said. Then she reached out and ruffled his hair. "But not you."

"Not me?"

"Not you."

"The other springs want me."

"Well; I don't. It suffices to say it would cause a great deal of confusion later, if you were to fall into my spring."

"I'm going to meet you later," Ranma deduced. "Before you –"

"Before I drown; yes."

Ranma stared. "You're not gonna drown," he announced. "First I'm gonna save you, and then I'm gonna marry you."

"Oh!" she exclaimed, clapping one hand over her mouth. "Oh, _Ranma_, that's _lovely_, but… seriously, are you promising yourself to girls at _this_ age?"

"I'm gonna marry _you_ and _just you_," he said. "I like you. Please don't cry."

The spirit lady grinned at him through the beginnings of tears. "I won't, then," she pronounced, clapping her hands together in determination. "Where is Ryoga? I don't see him here." And she craned her neck up to peer across the mists.

Ranma felt himself get glum all over again, even if he had met his future wife. "I was chasing Shampoo an' –"

"Shampoo! What were you doing chasing Shampoo?"

"She was tellin' me that boys are weak and dumb. I couldn't stand for that!"

The spirit lady laughed, and a warm feeling grew in Ranma's tummy that he had the power to make her happy again, even if it seemed like she was laughing against her will. "Of course not," she agreed after a moment. "Never. But how'd you _meet_ Shampoo?"

Reluctantly, Ranma told her about the cats, about Ryoga, and about Elder Cologne. If he played up his heroism in receiving the stitches, he was only human and had a deep desire to impress his future wife.

She smiled once he was through, and laced her fingers through his. "You're going to be just fine, Ranma," she said. "You're going to be a real Man Amongst Men."

"Yeah?"

His wife nodded, solemn. "Absolutely. Even when – it doesn't appear that way."

Ranma wasn't really sure what that meant, and some of his confusion must have shown on his face because she turned his chin towards her with one finger.

"That means that there's more to being a real man than being macho," she said, and her voice was quiet but intense. "There's honor and respect and understanding and friendship –"

"Those all sound awfully girly," Ranma said, dubiously.

"Look!" she exclaimed with a smile, eyes lighting up in a way that made Ranma feel all mushy inside. "There's Ryoga now."

Sure enough, Ranma saw Ryoga sliding down the same slope Ranma had. Ryoga landed and took off at a run.

"Reckless," said the spirit, shaking her head solemnly.

Ryoga arrived barely out of breath and scooped Ranma up immediately.

"You don't ever run off like that again!" he growled. "You – you're injured, I thought – and then I find you _here_ – I'm going to _kill_ that girl – "

Ranma squirmed. "I'm fine. Put me down!"

After a moment, Ryoga complied, sliding Ranma down carefully until both of his feet were firmly planted on the ground. He looked around but couldn't find the lovely woman.

"Where'd she go?"

"Where'd who go, Ranma?"

"The – the woman! She was right there…"

Ryoga looked more cautious, now. "What woman?"

"She didn't even tell me her name!" Ranma shouted, cross. "How'm I gonna recognize her? What if I forget what she looks like?"

"_Who_, Ranma?"

"The drowned lady!"

"A redheaded drowned lady?" he inquired, voice strangely choked.

"No." Ranma shook his head. "She was _Japanese_. How's she gonna have red hair? It was dark, and shiny, and short."

"And she – spoke to you?"

"Yeah! An' come to think of it, she knew you! Said I was gonna meet her before she drowned."

"Her name is Akane Tendo," Ryoga said, slowly.

"Tendo…"

"That's right," Ryoga told him. "Akane is your age right now. She is the heir to Tendo-ryuu."

Ranma was beginning to wonder how many kick-butt and take-names girls he was gonna know. "I have to meet her," he said fervently.

"Oh really?" Ryoga prompted, ducking his head with a small grin.

"Yeah! We're gonna get married when we're older!"

Ryoga's head snapped up. "Did she tell you that?"

"Of course not! The boy asks the _girl_."

"Of course. Silly me. You decided you liked her and proposed on the spot, is that right?"

"Almost made her cry. I thought it was the wrong thing to do for a minute. The way she talked, it sounds like I promised that to a lot of girls."

"Akane shouldn't have said anything."

"I'm not gonna promise anyone else," Ranma swore.

"That's good."

"I mean it."

"I'm glad."

"…could we go?"

Ryoga nodded. "Yes. Sure. Just – " He scanned the valley quickly, as though looking for enemies to fight. " – just keep a tight hold on my hand, okay?"

"Yes, Ryoga."

Ryoga stared at him. "What was that?"

"Yes – sir?"

"No. I mean, Ryoga is fine, it's just – I guess I'm not used to anyone – much less you…" Ryoga petered out, passing a hand over his face. "Never mind it, Ranma. Just hold tight. You don't want to become a parakeet, do you?"

"No, Ryoga."

"That's – that's good. We'll be fine, if we just walk in a straight line."

And that worked out – for a little while.

They were halfway across the valley before a tiny bamboo shoot seemed to appear suddenly in front of Ranma's feet. He danced around it, slipped in the wet, and somehow let go of Ryoga's hand in his flailing.

He heard a splash, and then water closed over his head with the finality of a slammed door.

* * *

A/N: Thanks to everyone who reviewed the last chapter! As someone who works in the school system in the U.S., I don't have as much time now as I did in August because school is now in session! I may not be able to reply to everyone anymore but I nonetheless appreciate your comments and read them all!

Re: Shampoo and getting along with her. I figured it was an even toss as to whether they'd fight or not, and I consider it a really _good_ thing that Ranma didn't win, and for more than one reason. In this case I think I went for what would work best with what I'd envisioned so far, rather than with the court of popular opinion; though honestly you guys seemed pretty divided on the matter.

Let me make this next bit about side characters. How much, if at all, are we going to deal with Mousse? Kuno? Kodachi? Who do you think might interact interestingly with wee!Ranma and who should we leave for when he's a bit more grown up? Obviously he will meet the Tendos as a child, although that's not going to happen just yet. And now he has his own personal motivation for going there, _besides_ meeting up with Genma...

As always, I appreciate reviews, support, proddings for more as well as comments about how it's working so far! Reading comments really does help me write the next chapter, for motivational reasons if nothing else. :) Thank you as always!

-K


	4. Mine

Chapter Four: Mine

* * *

The first sensation Ranma was aware of was a biting cold that seemed to render him tingly, then almost instantly numb. The next was –

_Oh no oh no oh no -!_

Ranma opened his mouth to scream and it filled with water. Blood pooled in front of his vision, and he flailed, suddenly unsure which direction was up. Then one big arm reached inside the pool, grabbed onto the back of his gi and yanked up.

Ranma fell, coughing painfully to the floor. "Hurts!" he exclaimed, when he could get the breath.

Ryoga was at his side in a minute. "Your stitches," he breathed, ripping off the bottom of Ranma's gi top as though it were cheesecloth. "I don't understand it," he muttered, under his breath. "How can you have gotten _bigger_?"

Ranma wasn't sure what that meant until he looked down at the stitches, which were definitely pulling, now. But the skin under Ryoga's fingers looked human, not animal, so he wasn't sure how he could've somehow grown.

Ryoga scooped Ranma up, then ducked low, bunching his muscles together before leaping high in the air.

Ranma gave a surprised, breathless gasp as Ryoga pushed off of a bamboo stalk and leapt them clear, to the ridge that surrounded the valley. "You can jump really high," Ranma observed, panting.

"Yeah, lots of practice," Ryoga agreed. "So we've got to heat some water for you, though, because – just trust me, we do," Ryoga said, and he slid his pack off his back more quickly than Ranma had seen him do so, in his limited experience. Ryoga's hands were shaking as he removed flint and a cooking pot. "I've got to go get some tinder, just – just wait here. Try not to move."

Ranma's eyes were trained on Ryoga's features, which were pinched and, judging from Ryoga's intense tone of voice and fumbling hands, Ryoga was frightened for Ranma; so Ranma did just as he'd been told and sat very still until Ryoga returned with some dried leaves and pine needles.

"Ranma," Ryoga said, once the kindling was smoking and he could add tiny sticks, "that valley is very dangerous."

Ranma nodded, solemn. "Yeah."

"Those springs – they're what make it dangerous."

"Akane told me: the springs want to curse you. And I could hear 'em, and she was surprised."

Ryoga looked up at that. "The springs _want_ to curse you?"

"Yeah. And I guess one got me, but it must not've worked, 'cause I'm still talking to you and all."

"Ranma…"

There was that pinched face again, with a dash of something else. Ranma found himself trying to analyze the expression, but he didn't have much to go on, not having known Ryoga for all that long. Ryoga's eyes darted towards him and then away, like he didn't want to look Ranma in the eye. Maybe he didn't; maybe he was embarrassed, or avoiding talking to Ranma because it was something _really bad._

"You fell into a spring in Jusenkyo. You are cursed. It's just had to tell when you're a little kid, I guess –"

Ranma looked down at his body; it looked perfectly familiar, except maybe a little thinner. "Am I taller?"

"Against all odds, yeah. Just a little." Ryoga gulped, then turned towards Ranma, finding his courage. "Ranma, you fell into a spring where a girl drowned."

"A person? Really?" Ranma blurted, before he'd had time to realize what that meant. "That's terrible!"

Ryoga nodded, then waited while Ranma put two and two together.

"I – I'm a _girl_?"

Ryoga nodded again, solemnly.

"But I don't feel any different!"

Only that was a lie. Ranma felt _really_ different, scary different, and new differences seemed to pop forth with every new moment. "I – I don't _sound_ any different!" Except he did, and moreover sounds were different in and of themselves, which – oh, _no_ – that was crazy. Girls didn't _hear things_ differently from boys!

"You don't sound very different, Ranma," Ryoga said, and there were layers in his voice that hadn't been there three hours ago, and his face told Ranma more than if he'd spoken a paragraph's worth. "A boy's and girl's voice is pretty similar at your age."

Ranma gulped for air, but that hurt his stitches, so he clamped a hand down on his side and tried to breathe deep and slow, like the yogi on the mountain.

"It's going to be all right," Ryoga said. "Look, I'm heating you some water. When the water gets hot enough, it'll be able to turn you back to a boy."

"Really?" Ranma gasped.

"Really – but not for good. From now on, cold water is going to make you a girl," he replied.

Cold water would make him a girl _forever and ever._

"For some reason, your girl-form is taller than you right now. Ranma, how much did you grow this year?"

Ranma blinked away tears of shock and pain. "I – I haven't grown this year. I'm s-smaller than the boys my age." Which, he knew, was part of the reason his daddy had taken him from home: the boys in his form were beginning to tease him a little, push him around. He'd been ecstatic when his father informed him, steely-eyed, that he wouldn't be going back to that school, not ever.

"You're about to have a growth spurt, I'd guess, and your boy form is behind your girl form."

Ranma shook his head. "I don't have a boy form and a girl form, I'm just _me_, Ranma!"

"I know who you are, Ranma," Ryoga said, and Ranma's new girl ears perked right up at the change in tone, and he turned to stare at the older boy. "I do know you, and you have to trust that I know you'll be fine. You never lose, Ranma, and now's not the time to start."

"Yes, Ryoga."

Ryoga chuckled, losing his gravitas suddenly as he put the pot of water onto the warm coals of the fire. "That gets me every time. Who taught you to talk like that?"

"My momma did," Ranma replied. "It was 'yes, ma'am' and 'no, ma'am' when I'd been bad or she was saying something important. And sometimes in public, too."

"You haven't been bad," Ryoga said, slowly. "I know I said I was sorry you'd run off, but Shampoo was picking on you and I don't blame you for running after her. On top of that, I never forbade you from exploring. I should've, but I didn't figure you'd be able to run this far on your own."

Ranma shook his head. "You're just serious a lot. You've told me a lot of really important things, so I answer you serious."

Ryoga ducked his head for a moment, then shook it and turned to check on the temperature of the water, muttering, "not yet." Then he turned to Ranma. "I mean that – I hope you know this isn't your fault," he said. "I mean, it really isn't. And it isn't so bad. I know your father wanted you to be a man amongst men, and I think you still could be. It might even make you a better man, seeing what being a girl is like. But it – it's gonna be okay, Ranma. I promise."

Ranma absorbed this for a moment. "Girls see better in the dark," he said, suddenly.

Ryoga turned to look. "Yeah?"

"At least this one does." Ranma paused. "Me, I mean. And there's a lot more to see." Ranma wasn't sure how to explain that his field of vision seemed to have opened up, even if everything seemed oddly… flatter.

"Your _eyes_ work differently as a girl?"

Ranma nodded. "I can't wait to see the world when it's day," he added in wonderment.

Ryoga chuckled, shaking his head. "It's just that you've never said…" He stirred the coals and peeked at the water. "Should be warm enough. Come here, Ranma."

Ranma approached and squeezed his eyes shut as warm water ran down his frame. He felt odd as his body rearranged itself, but the pain in his side subsided with a wary throb.

"Better?"

Ranma nodded.

Ryoga took a closer look at the stitches. "Seems like you only broke one or two after all," Ryoga observed, digging some gauze out of his pack and pressing it gently to the wound. "The rest are pretty red and angry, though. Are they still hurting you?"

"A little," Ranma shrugged. "Not so bad, now."

Ryoga taped the gauze in place and threw road dust over the smoking coals of their fire. Then he gathered up his stovepot and flint, packing everything neatly away.

"I'm not really sure –" Ranma began, then paused. "It's going to be okay, isn't it?"

Ryoga laughed, and something unclenched in Ranma's guts. "I promised, didn't I? A girl-curse is strange and different, Ranma, but it doesn't hurt, right? I mean, normally."

"No, it feels weird, but the only part of me that hurt when I… you know… was my stitches," Ranma replied.

"And it doesn't make you sick, right?"

"No."

"Does it… cause you to have a thirst for blood? And fangs? And to not like garlic?"

Ranma giggled. "Nooo!"

"Does it… make you tiny like a bug?"

"No!" Ranma exclaimed. He liked this game.

"Does it… make you huge like a mountain!"

"Well…" said Ranma, thoughtfully. "It does make me a _little _bigger."

"Giant-sized?"

"…no."

"Then what is there to worry about?" Ryoga demanded, lifting Ranma up to his hip. "I think we've had a long night. What do you say we take the fast road?"

"Mmm," Ranma agreed, because his head was already nodding. He saw a big, bright rectangle form in the air, and then they were standing outside of Shampoo's and Elder Cologne's village, striding through the streets in the moonlight. Ryoga placed his warm hand on the small of Ranma's back, and the next thing he knew, he was being deposited into a hammock-like bed inside of Elder Cologne's cottage, arms falling away from Ryoga's frame.

"Go back to sleep," Ryoga said. "We'll talk a little more in the morning. Remember that you want to see with a girl's eyes in the sunlight, okay? You're going to be all right."

Ranma tried to nod, but he was already slipping down, down, under a blanket of dark exhaustion.

* * *

When Ranma woke, it was with a start: Cologne was staring at him with frank curiosity.

"That's going to scar," she said.

Ranma looked down at his flat tummy, where blood had soaked through, then dried along Ryoga's makeshift bandage. "That's okay," he said slowly, "even if girls don't like scars."

"Girls like them plenty," Cologne assured him, with a thin chuckle.

"Not on themselves," Ranma countered.

"Getting a girl-curse doesn't make you a Real Woman." Cologne looked as though this were likely a good thing. Maybe she was the one who'd taught Shampoo all those backwards things about women being stronger.

"Oh, I know _that_," Ranma replied; but it did make him feel a little bit better to hear that womanhood didn't come solely from an accidental dunking. Ranma thought that was a little like someone falling into a spring where a guy had drowned and instantly becoming a Man Amongst Men: just not possible.

"You're awake!" Ryoga exclaimed, dusting off his hands as he strode into the cabin. "I've just been planting beans, sort of helping repay the Elder's hospitality –"

"Don't be silly," Cologne returned. "You certainly don't have to –"

"Your friends made it perfectly clear that my help was expected," Ryoga broke in. "But I don't mind. I've been feeling a little awkward, honestly, eating up all your food and lounging around."

Ranma looked up at Ryoga with his boy-eyes. All the depth, the three-dimensionality of Ryoga's face had returned, but the quirk of his lip as he replied to Cologne no longer held volumes, and therefore could no longer hold Ranma's attention for long before he found himself more absorbed with the play of the light through the window as it fell in geometric patterns.

_Weird_.

"…let the boy outside to run around for a bit," Cologne was saying, once Ranma snapped his attention away from the dust motes dancing in the sunny cabin air.

"Last time, he and Shampoo had an altercation –"

"I assure you," Cologne said, and Ranma blinked at the sudden change of expression, and wished its meaning were as clear to him as it would have been last night, "that there was nothing untoward in Shampoo's actions. She was attempting to prove herself the best warrior of her generation, a title she's held since she was three, and one she dearly desires to keep."

"Fighting an injured child is hardly the way to prove her strength," Ryoga said with a crooked smile, and Ranma saw a tiny charge spark the air between them. He could tell that they were arguing, but couldn't discern the meaning behind it, which made it just a touch scarier. Ranma tried to hug his knees to his chest, then winced, letting go immediately. It seemed every motion he made, no matter how careful, hurt his tummy.

"Ranma's opponents won't always be so friendly as Shampoo in the future. They will come quietly, without announcing themselves, without awaiting his recovery from their attacks. Why should Shampoo do any differently when she fights? Anything else would be a disservice to Ranma: an insult."

"You figure five years old is the time to teach that particular lesson?" Ryoga queried, and he hadn't raised his voice, but Ranma got the feeling he might as well have been shouting. Ranma was a step away from leaping down from the bed and tugging at Ryoga's wrist to get him to stop talking to Elder Cologne.

"What better time? Get them used to the real world while they're young."

"That's what his father thought."

There was a moment's quiet. Then, "I've been thinking. It's high time Shampoo learned another special technique; she picked up the Chestnut Fist so quickly."

Ryoga's eyes narrowed. "You wouldn't do that."

"Why not?" Cologne's eyes gleamed as she regarded Ranma, who drew back towards the wall behind his hammock. "And perhaps the only reason it didn't work for young Ranma, here, is that he just wasn't _pushed_ enough. Perhaps, if you tried again…?"

Ryoga slid in front of Ranma, one hand gripping the side of the makeshift bedding as though he intended to snatch Ranma up at any moment. "It's not up for discussion," he said.

Each word came out as though there were other words pushing behind them: words Ryoga didn't want to let out.

"Gracious, to think this whole regrettable conversation started just because you didn't want Shampoo playing with –"

"Damn _straight_ I don't want your kid fighting with mine!" Ryoga shouted. "She's violent, she's undisciplined, and she's _spoiled_, and it's no wonder if you reward her every time she does something violent! Ranma's injured, of _course_ he shouldn't fight until he's well, he's a _child_, and – and if you _ever_ mention making him go back to – I'll die first!"

Cologne maintained a very respectful mein throughout Ryoga's rant, but towards the end, she broke into a surprisingly gentle smile. "There it is," she said, quietly. "I hope you'll forgive me for pushing you and _your_ boy."

And what she said must've made sense to Ryoga, because he turned to face Ranma, looking shocked and dismayed.

Ranma placed a hand on Ryoga's forearm and patted, not really knowing what else to do.

"No," Ryoga said, looking at him. "No, I meant –" He paused, running a hand over his face. Then he spoke to Cologne again, determined. "I'm taking him to the Tendos." He opened his eyes and took Ranma by the shoulders. "I'm taking you to the Tendos."

"I know," Ranma said, patiently, looking up into Ryoga's distressed features. "To wait for my father."

Ryoga nodded. "That's right."

"How long have you known Ranma?" Cologne inquired, and her voice wasn't just nice now: it was cautiously gentle, talking Ryoga down as easily as she'd gotten him worked up. Ranma felt a little awestruck: he still wasn't exactly certain what had happened, but he knew he would be lucky if he could manage people so well as Elder Cologne.

Ryoga only stared at him.

"Perhaps Ranma _should_ run and play, now," the Elder went on in that same, cautious key. "I assure you, I _have_ disciplined Shampoo, and she is certainly not inclined, anymore, to tease your child."

"Ranma's not mine," Ryoga said, slowly.

Ranma didn't know the wounded noise was going to leave him until the Elder and Ryoga were staring. He flushed self-consciously, but Ryoa pulled him quickly out of the hammock and into his arms.

"Oh, sweetheart, that's not how I mean it. I just mean – you're Genma's, you're your father's, that's all. I don't mean I don't care about – I mean, you know that I'd never let anything –"

"New to this, are we?" Cologne chuckled, thoroughly at ease again. "First-time fathers have such troubles –"

"I'm not his father! I'm – I'm his friend, I'm –" Ryoga's grip strengthened until Ranma squeaked.

"Let the boy go," Cologne said again. "It's past time we had a real talk, you and me."

But Ryoga seemed reluctant. "You wouldn't –"

"Very open-hearted, are you? Not used to deception, eh? Then let me make myself perfectly clear. Saotome Genma was a blight on this child, and I'm glad the boy's with you. Anyone who attempts the Catfist is a fool, and a thoughtless, mindless fanatic to the Art on top of that more fundamental foolishness. I would never allow Shampoo to attempt it, even if the ridiculous child were to live to come of age to try it on her own."

Ryoga met her glare-for-glare for a long moment, then set Ranma down. "Ranma," he said, without taking his eyes off of the older woman's, "go play outside, please." And then he did shoot Ranma a look, one too filled with meaning for Ranma to decipher.

But he could tell Ryoga wasn't happy, so he pressed Ryoga's hand in his. "Yes, Ryoga," he replied, and then darted as quickly as he could out the door and into the bright sunshine of a cool morning in the mountains.

* * *

A/N: I am perhaps more nervous about this chapter than the others put together. That's because I actually did research (gasp!) on the emerging science of gender differences and used the information, quite well aware that I might piss someone off by implying being a girl would give Ranma advantages in some ways and disadvantages in others.

In his brain.

Er... so I did some research, and this is what I discovered:

Women hear better than men, and are capable of detecting greater variations in tone of voice.

Women see better in the dark.

Women are many times more sensitive to touch and pain than men, and while they call a sensation 'pain' earlier than men do, they can put up with what they consider painful far longer.

Women and men's abilities in the realm of communication and spatial awareness develop at different rates. Young women are better communicators, and young men are better in the realms of the spatial and mathematical, but by the time they're grown up, they've more or less caught up with one another and can do all of these things with comparable areas (albeit different parts) of their brain lighting up. In other words, they reach the same destination, but take very different roads to get there.

Women see more colors, especially red. One out of fifty women has the ability to see a ridiculously greater variety than even other women do. Women also have a wider field of vision (better peripheral vision), but boys have better depth perception.

Girl babies spend a great deal more time looking at faces than boy babies from the first moment they open their eyes. Boy babies are equally enthralled by the motion of a mobile, but girl babies would ignore the mobile in favor of a person's face.

Most of these are things I figured Ranma would *definitely* notice, especially if his indoctrination in the lesser nature of women was not yet complete.

I should go ahead and add, in case this information were causing you to mistake me for a sexist (which would be, uhm, easy) that plenty of young men and boys are VERY emotionally savvy, and plenty of young women and girls are exceptionally skilled mathematically and spatially. Studies are based off of averages, not individual examples.

I will gladly provide you with my research links if you're interested. I think that the reason I've hung onto Ranma fanfiction as I've lost interest in other manga and anime is because of my fascination with the idea of gender. It's really incredible, weird, and absorbing for me to think about these things. I hope you found it interesting, too!


	5. Unforgiving

Chapter Five: Unforgiving

* * *

Ranma spilled out the door and trotted down the stairs, ignoring the pain in his side, and made quickly for the stream where he and Shampoo had bathed yesterday. He felt a little funny being so eager to see how the morningtime would change through the eyes of a girl; his daddy and his momma would certainly say that he should be proud to be a boy. And he was: boys were faster and stronger and smarter than girls, and they got to do all the fun things like martial arts and had important jobs and were the head of their families. They got to be Men Amongst Men. They got to be the best.

But as Ranma stared at the water, doubt began to creep through his brain. He _wasn't _the best. He hadn't been doing so well at being a Man Amongst Men lately: he'd failed at the Catfist and been beaten by a girl who wasn't even any older than he was. His father had to despair of turning him into a Man once he learned all these things. Maybe there had already been signs that Ranma was a loss. Maybe his daddy had already known that and that's why he'd gone.

His fiancee's words kept coming back to him, that he could be a Man Amongst Men even if it didn't look like it right away. And Ryoga had said that being a girl could make him a better man. Going by what they'd both told him, he should be exploring his new form because it could teach him a lot. And if he decided, somewhere along the line, that he liked one form better than the other, he supposed he could stick with it. Ranma was surprised by a flash of pity for people who grew up without that choice. _Imagine_, he thought gravely, _getting stuck with one or the other with no say in the matter at all!_

The thought was gone as quickly as it had appeared, and Ranma's stomach churned with brief shame in the wake of it, though he couldn't manage to put a name to why. Maybe that was his parents' voices again, saying how lucky it was he was born a boy, that giving it up would be squandering what advantages he had, by chance, been given. Ranma knew well enough that his mother, at least, would find his attitude ungrateful.

Ranma sank down on his knees and watched the water rush past, a school of tiny golden fish slipping downstream before his eyes. He wanted to stop thinking, because all of this was making his head hurt and his stomach fill with butterflies. He wanted to be one thing or another without examination, like everyone else. (He'd forgotten his pity for the rest of the human race entirely, stashed it away where no one, not even him, could judge it.) He wanted all the best parts of being a girl: the seeing thing, and the faces thing, and the _taller_ thing, which might have been best of all. That extra inch was _important_. With it, he might even be as tall as Shampoo. But he also wanted the best things about being a boy: being in charge, the _other_ seeing thing, being able to fulfill his parents' dream that he'd become a Man Amongst Men.

Even thinking about being a girl was like seeing wrapped presents under the tree and wanting to touch them and knowing he shouldn't. Knowing it would be a betrayal, knowing he'd no longer deserve what he had been given.

Ranma leaned out over the stream, and in the stream he saw a wavering picture of a boy with a fine musculature, a bit small for his age, with loose hair of a shining black, hanging in a soft fall since Shampoo had washed it, and wide, earnest grey eyes that looked a little wise and a little troubled. Ranma paused, transfixed; he'd barely glanced in a mirror since he'd left Japan, and his features were briefly unfamiliar to him.

No wonder Ryoga called him _sweetheart_, he thought, savagely, jerking up from his examinations and turning away from the water. He was half-girl already.

"What's the trouble?"

Ranma startled, then turned to see Wan Da approaching the stream from the west, carrying a brace of rabbits. "Nothing's the trouble. There's no trouble," Ranma blurted.

She paused, looking skeptical. After a moment, she stuck her brace into the earth and shucked her sandals to seat herself by the stream, dangling her toes in the water. Slowly, Ranma approached and sat beside her, sitting with his legs folded.

"A bit of cool water won't do it," she told him, gently, so Ranma dangled his legs as well. The water just barely brushed his ankles. "How're you doing, Ranma?"

"Good," Ranma answered automatically, but his fingers were tearing at bits of the tall grasses that grew by the waterside.

"Mmm," Wan Da replied, and for a long time they sat there quietly. Wan Da began to draw reeds from the river's edge, too, but she wove them cunningly together; before Ranma's eyes, a spiral pattern began to emerge.

"Cool," Ranma noted after awhile. "How…?"

She showed him. "Here and here. The key is to only weave a strand halfway before beginning a new one. That way you've always got a good, strong foundation before you turn to the new strand." She took another reed from the grass, plucking it with clever fingers. "Watch what happens if you don't." She tried to press the new strand without overlapping it with the old, her fingers exaggeratedly clumsy, and the new reed fell to the ground.

Ranma looked up at her. "Is that supposed to mean something?"

Her eyes widened, forest green brows climbing. "What would it mean?"

"That I need to have a good foundation before I try to build on it. In everything, right?"

"Why, Ranma!" she exclaimed. "You're so clever; I didn't even think of that."

Ranma smiled. "You're funny."

She grinned back at him and pressed a hand to the top of his head. "You're a good boy, Ranma. And very, very smart. Smarter than you realize, I think."

"I'm not smart," Ranma said. He didn't like admitting it, but he liked the idea of lying, of misleading Wan Da, even less. The idea that she might think he was smart only to discover the truth later caused the now-familiar flip in his stomach.

"Maybe you'll let me form my own opinions," she temporized, kicking her feet back and forth through the water as she wove. After a moment, Ranma followed her example, beginning to grin at the feel and noise of the splashing water and the sight of the startled fish. "I think you're clever for realizing that running away from being a boy isn't going to change the way you feel right now."

Ranma's splashing feet slowed, then stopped. That wasn't how he'd been thinking about it at all. "The way I feel right now?"

"Ranma," Wan Da said, and her voice went slow and careful, "a very bad thing happened to you. You're smart and you're strong, and you're handling yourself very, very well. But it's all right for you to be upset. I think Ryoga's waiting for you to be upset, and then be yourself again before you go to the Tendo Dojo."

"I am myself," Ranma retorted. "I'm totally myself! I'm ready to go now!"

Wan Da lifted her weaving, which looked as though it might be destined to become a basket or a bowl. "What do you suppose happens if one of these isn't woven tightly, Ranma? It becomes a hole, and eventually that hole widens, and the basket falls apart."

Ranma nodded. "Yeah," he said, miserably. "I got it: so don't leave anything unfinished."

Wan Da smiled. "See?" she said. "Smart."

He shrugged. "I don't know how to feel. Except nervous. I'm nervous all the time, now."

"And all that fear, you think it doesn't go with being a boy," Wan Da said.

Ranma's eyes widened at her guess, so close to the mark.

"That'll pass," she told him. "You might have nightmares for awhile, too, but keep Kitten around and she'll remind you of what's real."

Ranma nodded, thinking that made sense. Right now, everything made him nervous: the sweep of the wind through the trees, the _shh-shhh, shh-shhh_ sound the leaves made when it rubbed them together; the sound of a small animal crashing through the bracken; the sudden movement that was a bird on the wing. But he could see how eventually it could all come down to cats. That only made sense, and even if Ranma wasn't smart, he liked to think of himself as sensible.

For awhile, the pair were companionably silent. Ranma watched a tiny, red squirrel leap from tree to tree, chittering furiously at a small, white bird who landed too close.

"Ranma…" Wan Da said, finally breaking the silence. "I wouldn't know how to broach this question to a child, so I'm going to have to treat you like you're a grown-up. Is that all right?"

What an odd question; Ranma wasn't sure. "I guess," he replied, ducking his head to hide his confusion.

"Do you _want_ to go with Hibiki-san?"

Ranma's head jerked up, and his eyes narrowed. "Yes. Yeah. Why?"

"It's that reaction that worries me," Wan Da replied, gently. "You met Hibiki-san only a few days ago, and yet you're so eager for him to be your guardian. Why is that?"

Ranma looked back up at the red squirrel, which was now duking it out with the bright white bird. "I'm safe with Ryoga," he said.

"How do you know?" Wan Da inquired, fingers still working at the project in her hand.

Ranma frowned, but Wan Da's face looked open and curious rather than mean, so he went on, thinking of Ryoga setting the water out for Kitten, feeding Kitten so carefully.

Careful was Hibiki Ryoga all over.

"I just know," Ranma said stubbornly, crossing his arms. "And you ain't gonna take me away. Ryoga's taking me to the Tendo Dojo, and I'm going to meet my iinazuke."

Wan Da grinned. "Is that so? How exciting. And I don't want to take you away, Ranma," she sighed. "I promise. I just – I know that children who are so eager to make new connections with adults have often been… er, their original guardian…" She paused. "Ranma, did your father ever hit you?"

"Sure!" Ranma cheerfully exclaimed. "Lots of times! We sparred every morning."

Wan Da hung her head, and Ranma couldn't tell if she was close to laughter or tears. "No, no, Ranma, I mean – did he ever hit you when you weren't looking? Or – with a weapon, when you had none?"

Ranma shrugged, his eyes on the squirrel; it was winning for sure. "Maybe. I mean, he used to sneak up on me. Part of training."

"Would you say that your father never hurt you – _really _hurt you – on purpose?"

This was a new question, and Ranma had to think hard before he answered. "My father wants me to be the best martial artist in Japan."

"And he might hurt you if he thought it would help you do your best?" Wan Da prodded.

Ranma shook his head. Wan Da didn't understand, and he couldn't really make her, because the Man Amongst Men promise was a secret; she couldn't know how important it was, to momma, to daddy, to Ranma himself.

"I _want_ to be the best," he tried.

Wan Da nodded. "I know that, Ranma," she said, and wrapped an arm around his shoulders, inexplicably.

Ranma leaned into her, a little. Ryoga, Wan Da, even Elder Cologne were all much more touchy-feely than his daddy. He thought he might like that, even if all the hugging was a little girly.

"Race you back!" he exclaimed suddenly, wanting to break through his embarrassed pleasure and not quite certain how.

"Not with those stitches, you won't," Wan Da proclaimed. Instead, she scooped him up and placed him on her shoulders (to Ranma's instant and vocal delight), flipping her braid of forest-green hair out of the way. "Settled?" she inquired, and then together they walked back to Elder Cologne's cottage, leaving the half-finished bowl tangled in the reeds.

The pair returned to a much-quieter Ryoga and Elder Cologne. Ranma spilled in through the door and ran up to the young man but then paused, unsure. He was still working around what felt like dozens of new social rituals. Luckily, Ryoga reached for him and gave him a quick squeeze.

Ranma laughed, pleased, and danced away. "We went down to the water, and there were fish!" he blurted, then blushed. He wasn't sure Ryoga cared about his trip, or the fish therein.

"What kind of fish were they?"

Ranma's grin dawned again. "Orangey-gold ones! This big," he added, demonstrating with both hands.

"We stock the stream occasionally," Elder Cologne said, placing a knarled hand atop Ranma's head. "They're carp, Ranma."

"Were you a girl today?" Ryoga inquired in a too-light voice.

Ranma huffed, disappointed. "Wan Da and I got to talking, and I forgot."

"Plenty of time tomorrow," Ryoga replied, "but only if you want."

The door flew open, startling Ranma; but it was only Shampoo, coming in with a basketful of some kind of dirty, rounded things.

"A type of yam that only grows here," Wan Da explained.

"I don't understand why I not go hunting," Shampoo whinged, placing the tubers by the wash-stand.

"Because you love to hunt," Cologne replied, sharply. "Now: don't you have something to say to Ranma?"

Shampoo approached, and Ranma couldn't help but note all over again how the purple-haired girl had at least a few centimeters on him. If only he were his girl-self just now, he'd be able to stare her down.

"Shampoo apologizes to Guest, Ranma," Shampoo said, hands clasped lightly behind her back. "Challenging wounded warrior was out – out of line," she managed, struggling with the unfamiliar idiom. "Very disgraceful. Please accept."

Ranma grinned at her. "Sure!"

Shampoo blinked. "Eh?"

Ranma grabbed Shampoo's wrist and began to tug her outside to play; but then suddenly, Elder Cologne was in his way.

"I'm sorry, Guest Ranma," Cologne said with a flick of her gaze towards her great-granddaughter, "but Shampoo has not yet finished her punishment. She'll join you once she's completed her chores."

"Awww!" Shampoo moaned. "But I apologize!"

"Yes, you did, and very prettily," Wan Da agreed. "But you'll finish your punishment. Moaning about it only makes things worse."

Shampoo nodded glumly.

"Maybe I could help?" Ranma whispered to Ryoga.

Ryoga's eyes widened in surprise for some reason, but then he grinned. "That's sweet, Ranma, but I think that would sort of make it less of a punishment for Shampoo."

"But it's my fault she's in trouble!"

Ryoga shook his head. "It's Shampoo's fault she's in trouble."

"Yes, Ryoga."

The young man smiled. "I'm sure Elder Cologne could find some things for you to do, if you'd like to stick arou – yeah, I thought not," he finished, as Ranma made tracks.

* * *

Ranma ran straight to the river and leaned down, peering at his reflection again.

_That's it, _he thought. _I'm gonna, I'm gonna do it._ He waded out into the water and dunked his head. His stitches pulled again, but not as bad, and no blood trickled out into the water.

Ranma climbed out of the pool and looked around.

_Whoa._

The world was brighter, almost uncomfortably so: Ranma found he could not look in the direction of the sun as easily as a girl. But once his eyes adjusted, he collapsed back on the river's edge, gobsmacked.

There was more _red_ in the world – and more shades of it – than he'd ever seen before. Suddenly he understood the difference between the red-violet crayon in the Crayola box, and the violet-red. The world settled into more comfortable brightness after a moment, but it was still brighter and with greater contrast than before. Ranma blinked a few times, then leaned out over the river and peered at his reflection.

Wow.

Ranma's eyes were lighter and brighter themselves, or maybe it just seemed that way because everything did. Still, at least as far as he'd been able to tell, his eyes had been the gray of a classroom chalkboard; now they were definitively blue. His skin was a peaches-and-cream pale, and dusted with freckles across his cheekbones and nose, which were elfin. Ranma's lashes were the color of cinnamon and very long. But the _hair_. The rest of him looked a little like pictures of his momma's dead sister, but where on earth could he have gotten red, wavy hair from? Maybe the spring was at fault.

Ranma sat back on his haunches and tried to decide whether he was okay with being a _really cute _girl or not.

Suddenly and inexplicably, something Ryoga had said in the cottage came back to Ranma. When Ranma offered to help Shampoo with her punishment, he'd said that it was _sweet, Ranma_; he could hear Ryoga's voice again, and feel the rush of surprised pleasure at the older boy's approval. Maybe that was what Ryoga meant when he called Ranma _sweetheart_, that Ranma was being his nicest in that moment, being his best. Ranma reflected, with some confusion, how easy it was to be good for Ryoga, when it seemed his daddy was always reprimanding him for something or other.

But now that he thought about it, he hadn't been _perfectly_ good. He'd fought Shampoo, even though he knew it was a dumb thing to do. He'd gone down to the springs, even though something told him they were dangerous. But instead of being angry, Ryoga had been scared, scared for Ranma. And instead of yelling, Ryoga had hugged him. Ranma wished he could explain all that to Wan Da when she asked, but he wasn't smart no matter what she said, and it'd come out all wrong.

Ranma's stitches began to itch, so he built up a fire and then blew it out, leaving the hot coals. He found Wan Da's basket abandoned by the stream and filled it up with water, placing it on the coals; then he waited for a few minutes as the itching had turned to pain and a tiny spot of blood appeared on his tummy.

It was weird how little water it took when all was said and done, just so long as it went over his head. The reverse transformation was strange: his field of vision closed up a bit, but everything seemed to gain dimension. The color difference was drastic enough that everything looked grey at first; but after a moment, the colors became obvious, and the world looked much as it ever had… to the point that Ranma knew any other way would seem strange once more.

He could be wrong, but he thought that he'd adjusted to the differences much faster, this time.

He could be wrong, but maybe after awhile, he'd stop noticing the differences at all.

That was good. It'd be tough to have to go through all that in the middle of a battle. Although – and here Ranma paused to giggle – he guessed his opponent'd probably be pretty surprised, too!

That night, hours after Ranma'd bedded down, he was woken by the sound of whispery, important voices, voices he could make out if he concentrated hard enough.

"Something tells me you do know," Ryoga was saying in his most intense voice.

"What if I did?" That was Elder Cologne, voice low and cackling. Cologne-sama sounded amused, and Ryoga didn't… a confluence Ranma was coming to expect.

"You have your secrets, and you enjoy them," Ryoga said blandly. "I understand."

"There is very little left that can amuse a woman of my years," Cologne explained. "I have to find my little joys someplace."

"Tell me this, then: how likely is he to arrive at the Dojo?"

There followed a bit of silence.

"Who can say?" Elder Cologne replied, sounding a bit more grave. "But if you want my opinion…"

"I value your opinion, Elder," Ryoga said in his most respectful tone.

"…I don't believe Saotome Genma will return. There is very little of him left."

"But his son –"

"If his son had the ability bring him back," Cologne said quietly, "it would have happened by now. But the personality springs are unforgiving. Saotome should not have stolen from the Musk."

Ranma wanted to listen with all his heart, but his bunk was warm, it was dark, and he felt truly safe for what felt like the first time since the pit. Kitten leapt up to curl beside him, purring sweetly, and he fell asleep to the sound of her voice.

* * *

A/N: Been awhile, I know. But if you read my HP fanfiction, you already know that I am attempting to finish all extemporaneous - extraneous - er... all of the stories I've started but not finished. Sorry to say that doesn't include JSF; that story is still too far from complete. But there are a pile of stories that are all around the 100-pages mark that will start being posted hopefully by November's end. Hope you liked this one!

Oh, yeah - about the 'sweetheart'. In my mind, Ryoga calls Ranma 'anata', which is about the same level of slightly over-the-top endearment... It's Ryoga's way of showing tenderness to a child he feels hasn't seen enough of it. And Ranma isn't wrong - Ryoga calls him that when he finds that Ranma has done an especially good, kind thing... when he finds that Ranma has been sweet enough to earn it, or hurt enough to need it.

-K


	6. Sky

Chapter Six: Sky

* * *

Elder Cologne sure liked children to be busy, Ranma decided after hauling the eleventh bucket of water to the large, communal garden in the center of the village. Shampoo was already there, talking to a tall boy with glasses, empty bucket dangling from her hands.

Ranma looked up from where he was pouring the water carefully around the roots of the cabbages, trying not to burn the leaves. He seldom saw Shampoo speak to any other children. She spoke to Ranma begrudgingly, and in fact, she seemed to be trying to evade the other boy's attempts to engage her, weaving out of his way and speaking to him indirectly over her shoulder.

Ranma swiped a hand up to his brow, displacing sweaty red fringe, and stared as the boy crossed his arms over his chest and shouted something that made Shampoo stiffen. Then, as if feeling eyes on him, he turned his attention to Ranma. "Hey," he said, walking up to Ranma. "What are _you_ looking at?"

Ranma gaped. The boy's Japanese was flawless, better even than Wan Da's.

"Well?" the boy repeated. "What are you, stupid?"

Ranma flushed bright red. "I ain't stupid, just surprised! Where'd you learn to talk Japanese like that? I can barely speak a word of Chinese, and I've been here ages!"

The boy flipped long hair over one shoulder, looking down his nose at Ranma. "My father was Japanese," he said. "He spoke it at home all the time, and mother insisted I continue to practice."

"Cool!" Ranma exclaimed with a grin. "Maybe you could teach me Chinese!"

The boy's lip curled. "Why would I want to do that?"

Shampoo materialized by Ranma's side so fast that Ranma wondered if she knew some sort of secret martial arts technique for appearing and disappearing, like Ryoga. "Ranma no interested in fighting with Mousse!" she declared, draping a proprietary arm around Ranma's shoulders.

Ranma glanced at Shampoo out of the corner of his eye. The purple-haired girl's jaw was set squarely, and her gaze was at its most focused. Ranma knew from painful experience that anyone getting in Shampoo's way right now would be very sorry.

Mousse shrugged, making a stab at casual and failing. "Shampoo just doesn't like me 'cause she's a sore loser," he explained.

"Shampoo no like you because you _jerk_!" Shampoo growled, pulling Ranma's form yet further behind her, even if she and Shampoo were about the same size, now, and Shampoo had no reason to want to shield Ranma that Ranma could figure.

"Hey, uh…" Ranma tried, but Mousse butted right back in.

"Now, now," Mousse said, shaking his finger. "You'd better be nice to me, because someday we're gonna be married."

Ranma's gaze shot from Shampoo to Mousse and back again.

"…and you know what they say about a wife who can't best her husband."

Ranma wasn't sure what they said about that, but Shampoo sure wasn't in the dark. She leapt forward with a furious shout, face bright red. Mousse's eyes narrowed angrily, and he took to the air like a bird.

Ranma gasped as Mousse morphed gravity from law to humble suggestion. Shampoo, crouched low, evaded Mousse with ease at first, but then Mousse performed a tricky flip mid-air just before landing to kick Shampoo in the back of the head.

"Hey!" Ranma shouted, catching Shampoo under the arms and setting her aright. "Didn't anybody ever tell you that you shouldn't hit a girl?"

Mousse stared as though Ranma'd said something unforgivably stupid. "No," he replied. "You are sort of dim, huh?"

Ranma rolled up his sleeves and nodded to Shampoo, but the purple-haired girl was too focused on her opponent to even notice that Ranma had entered the fray. Ranma realized that he would have to evade Shampoo as though she were another opponent, but set his jaw and gave that right hook his best shot.

Mousse caught his arm and literally tossed him aside to face Shampoo. Ranma shook his head to stop it from spinning, which seemed to work. Then he re-focused on Mousse and rushed him while the boy looked absorbed in fighting the other girl.

Mousse saw him coming again, and spun, ejecting Ranma with his centrifugal force. Ranma landed hard on his butt, and Shampoo flew after, landing in Ranma's lap. "Come back when you're both more of a challenge," he tossed over his shoulder as he strode off down the garden path.

Ranma remembered the humiliation of being beaten by Shampoo like it was a dream: that fear of never being good enough seemed a little strange lately. Instead, he found himself filled with a plain and uncomplicated fury. "That _jerk_!" he shouted, setting Shampoo to her feet by her waist this time, then accepting the purple-haired girl's hand to scramble up. "Where does he get off?"

Shampoo stared, baffled at the way Ranma had twisted his words.

"I meant… what is his _problem_?" he clarified.

The girl sighed. "Mousse has talked of marrying me since last summer," she said. "But we are good match in battle – sometimes he win, sometimes me. A wife must be stronger than her husband, or…" She shrugged.

Ranma stared. "Or… what?"

Shampoo shrugged again. "Is big dishonor," she said, uncertainly.

Ranma thought it was worse than that. Something pleased and ugly had been in that boy's eyes. She shivered. "Well – you, you've got to get better than him."

Shampoo nodded. "Learned Chestnut Fist two moons ago. But not enough." She sighed.

"I know! _I'll _help you train! You teach me and I'll teach you!"

The other girl looked unflatteringly skeptical, Ranma thought. "Maybe Ryoga can help too!"

Ranma had long since learned that it was really hard to get Shampoo to smile. Just now, one side of her mouth was twitching up a little bit. Ranma crossed his fingers and willed it bigger, and just like that, it was.

"Okay," the girl said peaceably. "Let's see if we can find him in the men's pasture."

Ranma jogged beside her on the beaten path that ran to the fields beyond the village, a plain studded with jutting bedrock where the men herded the yak and sheep that gave the village their milk and wool. "Hey, Ryoga!" Ranma shouted, stitches pulling just a little as he ran forward to greet the older boy.

For just an instant, when Ryoga looked up he seemed sad, troubled, and Ranma's step faltered. But at the sight of Ranma, he broke into a bright grin and scooped him up to sit on a nearby yak.

The yak in question looked, bored, to its hindquarters and seemed to do a mental shrug.

Ryoga then treated Shampoo to the same sweeping hug and yak-ride. The purple-haired girl gave him a shy smile; she seemed to thaw a little bit more in Ryoga's presence than she did for other people, Ranma included.

"What is it, ladies?" Ryoga inquired, leaning on his shepard's crook and gazing at the two of them as they sat astride the disinterested yak.

"We thought you could teach us some stuff!" Ranma blurted. "Martial arts techniques!"

Ryoga dug an apple from the satchel at his waist and polished it with a little grin. "Thought you'd never ask. This wouldn't be about Mousse, would it?"

Shampoo made a face.

"How do _you_ know about Mousse?" Ranma wondered. Sometimes, it seemed like Ryoga knew everything about everything.

Ryoga lifted one brow. "Well, Elder Cologne and Wan Da were both saying that Shampoo was having some problems with a boy from the village. Is he beating you, Shampoo?"

Shampoo nodded tightly. "Two out of three times," she grumped.

Ranma frowned as he worked that out. "How many times have you fought him? How do you keep track?"

Shampoo muttered something about a parchment she kept in her rooms – all her victories and all her defeats.

Ryoga stared, but recovered quickly, offering Ranma the rest of his apple.

Ranma seized it eagerly. He thought that ever since he'd gotten the curse, he'd been hungrier than ever; not that he hadn't always been hungry on the road, but this was a deeper hunger that ate at the inside of his tummy. He could hardly get the apple down fast enough, even if both Shampoo and Ryoga stared in a combination of surprise and distaste.

"Shampoo, where'd he hit you?"

"Is just bruise, that is all," Shampoo said proudly, prodding at the base of her skull; Ryoga made her lean down over the neck of the yak and pull her hair forward.

"Nasty bruise," Ryoga commented.

"That's what I told you," Shampoo countered, flipping her hair back into place with a motion so grown-up and expert that Ranma wished she could figure out how to do the same.

Except he didn't need to, really. Except sometimes, she might.

Ranma shook his head. A week ago, Wan Da had talked to him about how sometimes people might expect him to behave like a girl and other times they might expect him to behave like a guy, and that he had to decide whether he wanted to act like others expected him to or not. She had also explained that how Ranma decided to behave might depend on the situation.

Ryoga looked up at the setting sun. "All right, after we've got the herd back in their pens for the night, we'll talk."

Shampoo nodded eagerly. "Thank you, Ryoga." She slid off of the yak to land gracefully on her feet.

"Thanks!" Ranma echoed, allowing Ryoga to sweep him down. Sometimes, that was just nicer, even if he could jump higher than ever before, trying to keep up with Shampoo around the village.

"Why," Shampoo asked as they began to wend their way back to the Elder's cottage, "would you ask Mousse to teach Chinese?"

"Well, 'cause I don't know how to say anything at all," Ranma grumped, crossing his arms over his chest. "It makes me feel dumb, sometimes. A lot of the other kids whisper when I walk by."

Shampoo laughed. "Silly Ranma!" she exclaimed. "That is not why they laugh."

Ranma flushed, hotly. "You take that back!"

Shampoo paused, and took Ranma by the shoulders. "Sh – I just mean," she said, carefully, "that the curse is viewed in a… funny way, 'round here. Sometimes, curse is used for punishments. If you've been bad."

"Ohhhh," Ranma drawled. "I guess I can understand why they treat me funny, then."

"Going to the Cursed Springs by choice is seen as a great foolishness," Shampoo tacked on. "But here, if Ranma want to learn: _shú_," she said, pointing up ahead.

Ranma blinked. "Er… rock? Bird?"

"No, silly!" Shampoo exclaimed, bumping him with her shoulder in a way that was playful, but nonetheless sent him sprawling. "Tree, tree!"

"Tree," Ranma repeated. "_Shú_. What is a rock, then?"

"Rock is _yán_," Shampoo explained.

"Tree, _shú._ Rock, _yán_. Sky?"

"_Tiānkōng_," Shampoo replied.

Ranma couldn't repeat that, so Shampoo said it again. "I don't get it," Ranma said. "Tree and rock are so simple. Sky should be simple too, right?"

"Maybe word for sky is bigger because sky itself is bigger, too big for tiny word," Shampoo replied, gesturing up.

"You're really smart, Shampoo," Ranma said.

Shampoo's upturned nose lifted a bit. "I know. And you silly, silly boy, but I like anyhow."

Ranma rolled his eyes, but he'd already gotten used to the way Shampoo automatically thought boys were weak and foolish, even if he didn't enjoy it. If he imagined the word _girl _for _boy_, she might as well have been his father, the way she talked.

As they approached the cottage, Kitten ran to intertwine between Ranma's legs. "Kitten?"

"_Xiǎo māo_."

Ranma was delighted. "That sounds like a cat noise!"

Shampoo giggled. "It does!" It was clear she'd never thought of the phrase that way before.

Ranma ticked off a mental box. Let Shampoo keep track of her fighting. Ranma'd begun keeping track of something entirely different. He wanted to know how many times he could make Shampoo laugh, how often he could talk Elder Cologne into doing something with him other than a chore, the number of times he did a job well enough that Wan Da complimented his work.

Ranma entered the cottage to find Wan Da chopping up herbs for supper.

"Here," she said, and Ranma took over, handling the large knife with exaggerated care, until Wan Da handed him a much smaller one.

"Ryoga has promised to teach us some techniques," Shampoo announced in her straightforward way.

"That's very nice, Shampoo," Wan Da said, distracted as she danced between two steaming pots. "Just be sure you're done in time for supper in an hour."

Ranma and Shampoo exchanged a horrified glance. Ryoga had better get back soon, or they wouldn't have any time to learn anything!

Luckily, Ryoga arrived home only moments after the two children. He swept through the door and tucked Shampoo under one arm and Ranma under the other – up-side down. Ranma squealed with combined horror and laughter as Ryoga trudged back outside, finding them a nice, open area to work in after a bit of trudging around.

"No _shú_!" Ranma announced.

"_Shùmù_, if you mean more than one," Shampoo huffed.

"What, the ending changes? No fair!"

Ryoga frowned at them in mock-concern. "Are we learning Mandarin today, or are we learning martial arts?"

"Both!" Ranma exclaimed, and Shampoo chimed in with a studied nod.

"Let's start with height. Mousse is an aerial fighter, right, Shampoo?"

Shampoo nodded. "Up in air a lot," she replied. "Higher than I can go," she admitted in a low growl.

"Well, we can work on that," Ryoga told her. "Let's start with that rock over there. Ranma, can you jump up to that rock?"

Ranma examined the outcropping, then looked up at Ryoga and gave a proud nod. "Watch me!" he exclaimed, and leapt.

Ranma overshot the rock by a half a foot, and stumbled painfully forward. He sat up, shaking his head. He couldn't believe how stupid and klutzy he'd been. Jumping like that should have been nothing. Shampoo wasn't laughing – Ranma didn't think he could have stood it if she were – but her face instead looked all shocked, like she couldn't really believe it, either.

Ryoga lifted Ranma to his feet. "Ranma, sweetheart, you're a girl right now. Have you tried to test things like how fast you can run and how high you can jump as a girl, yet?"

Ranma shook his head. "I thought it'd be the same," he admitted, but even as he said so, he realized that was silly. If his vision was different, and his sense of taste and smell were different, it only made sense that other things would be different, too.

"It's important you learn how to fight as a girl as well as a boy," Ryoga told him, setting him on his feet. "You're all right?"

Ranma nodded and aimed for just short of the rock. Unsurprisingly, this time he landed just right. But he also knew he couldn't keep think of it as aiming for a different spot. If he thought like that, soon enough he'd forget that way of thinking, and miss.

Shampoo leapt through the air, getting further off the ground than Ranma, and landed beside the redhead. "Okay?" she asked, turning to Ranma.

"Yup! Got it this time!" Ranma exclaimed, and they jumped down together.

"Let's try something a little more challenging, then," Ryoga declared. Over the next several hours, he had the girls jump on progressively taller natural obstacles, until they were leaping to land on his shoulders. "That's pretty good," he said, when Ranma and Shampoo managed that without stumbling. "I think we should stop here for today, though. Elder Cologne is probably waiting dinner on us."

The two girls perched, one on each shoulder, and the trio walked back towards the village that way, Ranma giggling.

"How do we learn jump higher?" Shampoo wanted to know, tugging on Ryoga's ear.

"Ow! Shampoo!" Ryoga growled. "Well, there are some exercises I could show you that will make your legs and butt very strong," he suggested. "Squats will do it. Also, horse-stance."

Ranma groaned. He'd always hated horse stance, even if he was pretty good at it. It made his legs ache something awful after awhile. "All right," he moaned. "If it'll really help me jump higher."

"Wait 'til you get really high in the air," Ryoga promised. "It's something else."

Ranma and Shampoo slid down Ryoga's form as though he were a human jungle gym once the cottage came into sight. Before Ryoga could breach the door, they were back out, running for the pump to wash their hands before supper. Then Ryoga joined them at the pump, herding them inside before him.

Ranma chattered about his new training regimen to anyone who would listen.

"Are you happy to be training again?" Wan Da asked, carefully.

Ranma's girl-ears picked right up. This was about him being safe with Ryoga again; he knew it was. "Yeah," he said, and it wasn't even a little bit of a lie. He was so happy to be training again, to get that feeling of exhilaration running through him, to see what new things he could learn, what great things he could do. And for once, it wasn't about being the best – Shampoo and Mousse were both better than Ranma and that didn't even bother him, except for the part where Mousse was a jerk – it was about trying his hardest, which just wasn't the same. "Training's great. I can jump to Ryoga's shoulders!"

Wan Da tried to hide a smile, but Ranma knew she was pleased. It was strange, the way Wan Da just couldn't quite accept that Ranma was happy. He was with people he trusted in a beautiful, wild place. He had a pet for the first time ever, and loved her and doted on her. He had friends, if Shampoo could be called a friend; and if Shampoo couldn't be called a friend, yet, with her prickly personality and standoffish nature, Ranma thought they were well on their way. He had good food to eat and he was _training_ again, doing what he loved.

It might be disloyal to his daddy, just a bit – ungrateful, like the way he enjoyed being a girl, sometimes – but Ranma thought this might be the happiest he'd ever been. There were only two things that kept him from being perfectly content: the nightmares he had, and the seemingly random attacks of anxiety he had during the day; and that look on Ryoga's face when Ranma caught him unawares in the fields. If Ryoga wasn't happy, Ranma couldn't be entirely happy, either.

Ranma thought he might ask Ryoga about it, if he could get the older boy alone. So when Elder Cologne stated that it was Shampoo's turn to wash the dishes, Ranma seized the opportunity and pulled Ryoga outside into the gathering dark.

Crickets chirped, lightning bugs flashed off and on, and Ranma looked up at Ryoga with a frown. "You looked sad in the fields," he said without preamble. "I didn't want to bring it up in front of Shampoo, 'cause I wasn't sure you wanted to talk about it."

Ryoga looked surprised, at first, but he didn't protest or say Ranma had been imagining it. "Well, Ranma… it's a little difficult for me, here. I have to admit, I didn't think we'd be staying here but so long. I counted on your chi reserves to heal you more quickly."

"I'm not healing fast enough?"

"No, Ranma," Ryoga hastily reassured him. "I – you're such a strong martial artist that I thought… but only grown-up martial artists have chi reserves that help them heal quickly. You probably are healing faster than most little boys – or girls – would from your wounds."

"Just not as fast as you thought," Ranma checked.

Ryoga nodded.

"You don't like it here," Ranma suddenly realized. That felt really strange, because it was the first time that he and Ryoga had disagreed on anything.

Ryoga shrugged, a half-smile that wasn't really a smile pasted on his mouth. "They treat grown-up men here sort of differently than they treat little boys and girls," he explained. "Elder Cologne and Wan Da are never anything less than kind and polite, but outside of the cottage, it's different," he explained. "I don't mind staying here while you heal up, Ranma, but I don't like it here. One bit."

Ranma's heart felt suddenly very heavy, and all the joy drained out of him. "_Oh_," he said. That really wasn't okay. The thought of people being mean to Ryoga made his guts all twisty. "Sorry, Ryoga."

"You and Shampoo make it pretty pleasant, no matter how stupid everyone else gets," Ryoga said. "Seeing you two play together is… well, it almost makes up for the rest."

"I don't know if Shampoo really likes me," Ranma countered. He was pretty sure she was warming up to him, but he wanted Ryoga's opinion.

"She likes you plenty, or she wouldn't've let you fight with her. Shampoo isn't very demonstrative… that means she doesn't _demonstrate_ her affection so you can see it on the surface – but I think she likes you a great deal."

"That's good," Ranma replied, satisfied, fitting his palm into Ryoga's. "But I'm still sorry you're sad."

Ryoga ruffled Ranma's hair. "When you're around? Totally impossible."

Ranma lit with a pleased grin. "Good. Wanna see the stitches? Elder Cologne says they're almost ready to come out. She says I'm almost better!"

Ryoga looked at Ranma's stomach with a grave thoughtfulness that disappeared when he looked up at the redhead. "I think she's right."

"So we can go soon, right?" Ranma pressed. "To the Tendo Dojo. And Akane." He paused. "Maybe… Shampoo might want to come."

"Maybe she might, but I doubt her great-grandmother would be pleased at the thought of me finishing up her training," Ryoga explained. "You can ask Elder Cologne when she's in a good mood and we'll see what she says."

Ranma nodded. Up in the sky, the moon was rising, bright and fierce over the valley.

"I'll give this place one thing: it really is beautiful," Ryoga whispered. "Do you remember when I told you about the _tsuzumi boshi?_ Can you find them?"

Ranma pointed, and Ryoga moved his arm until it was in just the right direction. Together, they sat on an outcropping of rock, pointing to various constellations and naming them until Ranma began to yawn.

"It'll be all right, Ranma," Ryoga said. "You just focus on healing up and making your legs stronger. I'll get the rest."

It seemed to Ranma's half-sleeping mind that something was very familiar about the way Ryoga had phrased that, but the exhaustion of a full day was catching up with him. He only realized he'd fallen asleep when Ryoga picked him up to carry him off to bed.

"Love you," Ranma whispered as Ryoga wrapped blankets up around his shoulders. Ryoga's hands froze for such a long moment that Ranma began to wonder if he'd said the wrong thing; but eventually, they resumed the businesslike motions of tucking Ranma into bed.

"Go to sleep," Ryoga replied, and with a last press of his hand to Ranma's forehead, he was gone.

* * *

A/N: This is one of those fics where the legions of backstory would be really impressive if it weren't eight years in the making. HM was the same way, though, so I guess I shouldn't complain. The longer a story percolates, the more I end up liking it in the end.

I always like to hear peoples' theories; the speculation bit is the most fun. :) I expect at least a few people to get a big surprise 'round about now, because I certainly dropped a few hints in this chapter about the story as a whole. So hit me with your best shot!

-K


	7. Bamboo

Chapter Seven: Bamboo

* * *

It was true that Ranma's life with his daddy had made him fit, but that was nothing compared to the games he and Shampoo played together.

Shampoo was showing Ranma a game that only boys played, with a flush to her cheeks and the breathless laughter that came from the forbidden. "See," she said, in the measured voice that Ranma now knew meant she was being careful with her Japanese. "Each bamboo is different note. When land – when _you_ land or when _I_ land," she corrected with a judicious nod at her own gaining wisdom, "a note must be called out."

Ranma eyed the height of each pole of bamboo. "Like a _music_ note? Like _singing_?" Shampoo's insistence that only boys played this game had him in his boy-form, and his daddy hadn't encouraged him to sing so much on the road. "I'm no good at that."

"_Yes_, like singing," Shampoo said. "Have seen before. _Heard_ before. Is very beautiful. _It_… is very beautiful." Her blush grew crimson. "Ranma could _try_ to play…"

"You've always wanted to," Ranma realized, the blushes and sneaking Shampoo had been doing lately coming together in his mind. "But you're not allowed?"

Shampoo grew red as a tomato and shook her head. "We do something else," she said, leaping down from the rock on which she had perched to declaim the rules of the game from on high. "Is not important."

"No, it's all right," Ranma said. "I'll play. C'mon, Shampoo, I wanna play. With you."

Shampoo's smile flashed with enthusiasm as she described the height of each bamboo stalk denoting how high or low the note.

"What if you can't land on bamboo?" Ranma inquired, glancing around the sodden field. "What if you miss and land on a rock?"

"Then you shout 'rock'. Obviously."

Ranma blinked at her. "Oh," he replied. "Okay. Any other rules?"

Shampoo nodded, earnest. "If land on animal, game stops and you pray for spirit."

Ranma stared. "Ooookay," he drawled. "Anything else?"

"Inharmonius notes lose points."

Ranma tossed his dark ponytail over his shoulder and frowned. "In – In – what's that word mean?"

Shampoo's spine straightened with pride as she pronounced the difficult word. "In – har –mon – i – ous. It means notes that aren't – together – right."

"So I have to watch where you're jumping, and you have to watch where I'm jumping," Ranma realized. "Wow."

Shampoo nodded.

"Why don't girls play this game?" Ranma pressed. "It sounds –" He didn't want to say pretty, or complex but fun, like the cat's cradle games he only played when his daddy wasn't around. Probably Shampoo would say only boys could be pretty, or like those sorts of games, since everything was all twisted around in the Valley.

Sure enough, Shampoo replied, "girls no sing!" with such scoffing surety that Ranma was briefly cast into doubt. Was it girls who sang all the time back home, or was it the boys?

It took a moment before he got his mental footing; and when he did, he glared at Shampoo, who always got everything backwards. If he didn't know better he'd swear she did it just 'cause she liked making him feel all turned around; but he knew that wasn't it. Things were just different here, and that was that. Besides, the flush in her cheeks and the way she bounced from foot to foot let him know that she either really needed to make water, or she was eager to get along with participating in the forbidden game.

Shampoo jerked her head. "As I have experienced this game before, I shall go first."

Ranma's brows climbed. Now that Shampoo was learning Japanese, Elder Cologne insisted she use it all the time. Sometimes she sounded more grown-up than the older boys and girls Ranma had known back home. Sometimes she sounded like she thought she was royalty or something.

"Sure thing, Shampoo-sama," Ranma intoned with a bow, but Shampoo seemed to take it as her due. With a polite incline of her head, she leapt to the topmost stalk of bamboo.

Ranma blinked as she emitted a high-pitched screech – probably the highest note she could, which he guessed made sense. He began to wonder if this was like the shogi his daddy played, and giving Shampoo the first stalk had been a bad move: now she'd set the range. He shrugged and leapt for a stalk a few notes down and sang.

Shampoo nodded in approval. "Ranma catch on too-too quick," she said, and jumped, harmonizing with Ranma's bamboo, but striking now a melancholy combination that made Ranma think of the sad, sad songs his mother used to sing sometimes, when she wrung out the laundry and hung it up to dry in the sun.

Sometimes it still came on him like this, all of a sudden: that his daddy was gone, and his momma was back in Japan, still thinking he was with his daddy and thinking he was going to grow up to be that Man Amongst Men she'd always wanted – that Man Amongst Men Ranma was pretty sure he wasn't going to grow up to be. And there had been the kitties and the starving and the dying, and then Ranma had to think of Ryoga pretty quick or he'd be blubbering all over his new blue tang.

It was okay, though, with Shampoo around. She lit beside him, shouting, "ROCK!" – apparently this was one of the more fun aspects of the game – and wrapping a muscular arm around his shoulder.

"Shampoo," he said.

Shampoo pushed his hair back from his eyes and tucked it behind one ear. It was something she'd started doing just lately, and it always made Ranma's cheeks feel hot.

"Thanks for –" Ranma struggled for the words. It was great how well Shampoo spoke Japanese, now, and how quick she'd taken to it – his daddy would have said, 'like a duck to water'. But sometimes Ranma still struggled with his words – with putting things the way he wanted them to go. Words felt as slippery as the fish he caught in the river with Wan Da. "I don't gotta be a Man Amongst Men around you," he finally blurted, hoping against hope he'd got it right just this once.

Shampoo's face was puzzled, so he guessed she didn't really understand. The familiar frustration of not being understood tugged at Ranma, but he tried again.

"If somebody's strong for you, you don't always have to be the strong one," he said.

When Shampoo continued to stare at him the way she stared at Elder Cologne's maths, Ranma sighed and snuggled until his head was tucked underneath Shampoo's chin. "You don't want me to be a boy. You want me to be _Ranma_," he said, in a last ditch effort.

Shampoo's lips quirked. " 'Course," she said, patiently, and Ranma's heart burst with liking her so much that he had to kiss her, just on the nose.

Shampoo blinked, and drew back. She frowned. "What does this mean?" she said, after a minute of staring that made Ranma feel more awkward with every passing second.

"Nothing," Ranma said, suddenly acutely uncomfortable. He drew back. "Just – thanks. That's all it means is 'thank you'."

Shampoo blinked a few times more, for good measure. "Ranma no go kissing other girls of Juketsuzoku, especially not in girl form. It not mean that, here."

Ranma nodded. There sure was a lot to learn about the Juketsuzoku. "What does it mean?"

"It means, 'I kill you'," Shampoo replied serenely.

"Oh."

"_This_ means affection," Shampoo went on, and pressed her lips to Ranma's.

Ranma wasn't quite sure what to say when she drew back. So, "oh," he replied, again.

Shampoo rose, mussed his hair, and took off; Ranma, as always, followed close at her heels.

He thought he was beginning to understand how he'd ended up engaged to more than one girl at a time.

* * *

After that, he just knew he had to talk to his iinazuke again, before his and Shampoo's fight with Mousse. At first, he'd thought grown-up him was just a mean jerk, promising to get marry a bunch of poor, duped girls who didn't know any better, but now he wasn't so sure. If Shampoo began to like him like _that_… what if she were to ask him to marry _her_? What if saying no made her cry?

Ranma couldn't imagine being the one to make strong, pretty, self-assured Shampoo bawl. The thought of Shampoo curled up, sobbing – and Ranma being the one to make her feel like that – made Ranma's insides shrivel up. Maybe grown-up him felt that way about all the girls he'd gotten to know. Maybe they liked him and he couldn't make any of them cry.

If that was true, he was already halfway to becoming that jerk his iinazuke knew. So he had to find her and ask just how many girls he'd promised himself to, and why. It ate and ate at him until, a few weeks later, he decided he had to go.

He found Shampoo playing with Kitten in the garden. The purple-haired girl schooled her face from affection to impassivity very quickly once Ranma stepped outside, though. Shampoo didn't like people seeing her get all mushy.

"Hi," Ranma said.

"Hi," Shampoo replied, and went back to playing with Kitten, even if she was doing it a little more quietly, now.

"Um – Wan Da said she wants some ginger for supper," Ranma lied.

Shampoo looked up, then moved to one corner of the garden. "Okay."

"And – mushrooms."

The purple-haired girl looked up. "Mushrooms – dangerous."

"She said she trusts you to pick the right kind. It's – the kind we saw by the caves," Ranma improvised.

The caves were three miles away.

"It's a really special dinner," Ranma went on, awkwardly. "There are – people coming to visit." He wondered why this was so hard. Normally, he was pretty good at playing pretend – he and his daddy had made people believe all sorts of things together.

Maybe it was different when you were fooling someone you knew. Maybe that was why Ranma's heart fell when Shampoo stood, radiating excitement. "Ranma want to come?"

Ranma shook his head, regretfully. "Naw, thanks, Shampoo. Wan Da asked me to do some other stuff to help."

Shampoo nodded, knelt to drink a sip of water from her cup, and departed; Kitten stayed with Ranma.

Ranma snuck into the kitchen and took a wheel of cheese and filled a canteen with water and announced to the cabin (Wan Da, at the potter's wheel; Elder Cologne meditating in the corner) that he and Shampoo would be out training for awhile. Kitten wound around his feet and followed him outside.

"Are you sure?" he asked Kitten, who purred when Ranma leaned down to ruffle the top of her head. "You could fall into a spring, and become a girl, like me." For a moment, this thought appealed to Ranma, who envisioned a twin he could play with and train with, but he supposed he couldn't ask Kitten if it appealed to _her_, and it probably wasn't nice to give someone a new body without asking. "I know: I'll carry you," he compromised, and scooped up the grey kitten, hugging it to his chest. "That'll keep you safe." Kitten climbed up to Ranma's shoulder and perched there, the way that Ranma and Shampoo sometimes rode on Ryoga's broad shoulders. Ranma kept a hand up to steady Kitten, though she didn't seem to need it very much, and they headed off into the woods.

At first, Ranma saw himself following his and Shampoo's tracks deep into the woods, serious and keen-eyed, just like his daddy. He saw himself kneeling and examining broken twigs and footprints and ignoring scat and the tracks of deer and rabbit, just like his daddy had started teaching him. A real Man Amongst Men would find his way through the woods in this manner, even if it had been a long time – weeks? a month? – since Ranma had first bumbled his way through, chasing after the ever-elusive Shampoo.

As Ranma stood at the little stream's edge, pondering, he realized it had to have been longer than that, even. Wan Da had cut his hair – once just when he'd arrived in the Valley, and once again, just a week or so ago – and it was hard to imagine a time before he was best friends with Shampoo, unless it was when he was best friends with Ukyo Kuonji.

Maybe even a real Man Amongst Men couldn't find his way through a forest following a trail this old. His daddy had trouble enough tracing two- or three-day-old rabbit tracks.

Ranma sat down by the stream, watching the fish dart past and thought, very hard; and then he had a strange, marvelous idea.

Ranma deposited Kitten on the bank and dunked himself into the stream, sitting on the bottom to soak his head. When he pushed to stand up, Kitten tilted her head to one side and issued a startled mew.

"Poor Kitten," Ranma said. "It's still me."

Kitten sighed, padded in a circle, and sat, watching Ranma warily while licking one paw.

Ranma wasn't sure if it was because Kitten was just not very bright, or because Kitten really was still a kitten, but the animal hadn't made the connection that Ranma the boy and Ranma the girl were actually the same person. Kitten seemed convinced she had a master and a mistress; and she favored the master. Maybe because whenever Kitten met Ranma-redhead, she was covered in cold water, Kitten's least favorite thing.

"Oh, come on," Ranma said, hands on his hips, flipping his sopping, now-red hair over one shoulder. "No dice, huh," he tacked on, when Kitten continued to ignore him.

_No dice_ was a phrase he'd learned from Ryoga, and Ranma liked the way it sounded.

"All right, I'll go on my own," Ranma announced aloud, and closed his eyes.

Sure enough, he could feel the _call_, the _pull_ of the springs, even from here. He grinned with his eyes still closed and water clinging to his lashes, happiness filling him up to the brim.

* * *

Ranma stopped for food and water an hour later, more because he felt like stopping than because he felt tired or hungry. There was a pretty little spring that gave Ranma no bad feelings at all, and he stopped by it, splashed his face, and filled his canteen.

The Springs didn't feel any closer than before. It was no wonder Ryoga hadn't thought that Ranma would reach them by mistake. But the more Ranma thought about it, the more he thought that maybe it _hadn't_ been a mistake or an accident… that maybe when he thought he was following Shampoo, he was really following the call of the Springs.

That thought made the clearing seem suddenly dismal and unfriendly, so Ranma pulled his pack up to his shoulders and kept going. He hadn't realized, last time, that he'd run so far. He thought of Shampoo returning from fetching the mushrooms Ranma had sworn Wan Da needed for that night's supper, Wan Da exclaiming she didn't, hadn't needed any such thing. He had lied to everyone who was important to him, and most especially Ryoga… he'd promised not to come back here.

But he had to know: did he grow up to be a bad person? Akane would know – she was his iinazuke. She would know, too, if there was any way to change what he did in the future, living as she did in all moments at once. Ranma didn't exactly understand that, but he knew it had something to do with seeing the past and seeing the future, too.

Ranma'd begun to think maybe he'd imagined the ungentle pull of the Springs when he tripped over a root and sprawled forward. His arms curled down to catch himself only to meet empty air. He clutched again wildly, just managing to catch hold of a root. When Ranma opened his eyes – he'd closed them, _what a baby_ – his legs and torso were on solid ground, and his arms and head were jutting out over a high beam of rock that seemed to curl over top of the springs like one of the big ferns in the woods. Dozens – no, _hundreds_ – of springs lay below Ranma, gaping like open mouths waiting to swallow him up.

_Come,_ they whispered. _Come to us. We are revolution, we are chaos – only he who has come into our arms will ever truly master Anything Goes. Only he who understands transformation can ever be a Man Amongst Men, Saotome Ranma. Come, now, and be one with us._

For the first time, it occurred to Ranma that coming to the Springs again was more than lying to Ryoga and tricking Shampoo. What if he fell into another pool – what would happen to him?

_Power beyond imagining,_ whispered the pools. _Come, come little one, there is nothing to fear –_

_RANMA, YOU FOOL._

Ranma looked up to see his iinazuke's form floating over her pool.

_YOU STAY RIGHT THERE, I'M COMING TO GET YOU._

Ranma pulled his knees to his chest and waited. He could see the spirit coming closer and closer, and eventually she hovered just beyond his reach, over the Springs.

"Hi, Ranma," Akane said, folding her arms across her chest. "I suppose you've come to see me?"

Ranma looked up and nodded, mouth dry. "But it wasn't such a good idea."

She smiled, forgiving him, Ranma could tell. Ranma felt warmth building in his stomach that it was so easy to please her, but then a strange thought occurred to him. Akane seemed smart, but he knew some people could be stupid when they liked someone. He wondered if he'd hurt Akane a lot, but she was just stupid over him.

"What is it, Ranma?"

"Back when we talked, before –"

"… it's all now for me, Ranma," she reminded him with a smile.

"Before for me," Ranma corrected. "Anyway, you said… you said that I was already promising myself to girls. What did you mean?"

Akane tilted her head to one side with a tiny smile that crinkled her eyes, and Ranma knew all over again that she was going to be his one and only fiancee.

"You didn't let that upset you enough to come all the way out here on your own?" Akane sighed. "You did."

"Sorry," Ranma mumbled, rubbing at the back of his neck.

"It's all right," she said, waving him off. "So: you want to hear about the fiancees, do you?"

"Fiancees?" If there were only _two_, wouldn't Akane have said 'the other fiancee'?

Akane tilted her head to one side, then nodded. "Yes, Ranma. There's a world where Shampoo and you are engaged – at least according to her people."

"By a kiss?"

Akane looked at him sharply, and Ranma nodded to himself. Akane's reaction was enough; Shampoo's pressing her lips to his might have been asking him if he wanted to be her inazuke, and he had to tell her that he'd already got one. He sighed, deeply. He was going to hurt her feelings, he was pretty sure.

"And then there's Ukyo."

"But he's a boy!" Ranma blurted, then thought about it for a moment. "Ohhh, my girl form."

Akane gave him a strange look that Ranma was at a loss to interpret. "No, Ukyo Kuonji is a girl."

Ranma puzzled over this. Ukyo's father had been training him to take over his business and dojo, and Ukyo was really good at fighting, and a really good friend who was fun to be around. Ranma guessed he'd thought Ukyo was a boy because of those things, but of course all of these things were basically true of Shampoo, too, and Shampoo was definitely a girl. He guessed Ukyo could be, too.

"But I haven't seen Ukyo in a long time." The thought of Ukyo – and Ukyo's okonomiyaki cart, a much-beloved item that had to be left in the mountains when it became too difficult to carry – was painful.

Akane sighed. "Your father agreed to marry the two of you when you were very little. She eventually comes looking to collect. But he also agreed, before you were even born, that you were to marry me."

"_Oh_."

The spirit shrugged helplessly. "Sorry, Ranma. It's a bit much to deal with all at once."

"But now it's easy. I'll tell Shampoo that I like her, but not that way. Before she really sets her sights on me. Because sometimes people decide, but then it takes some time to get _used _to the deciding. And if you talk to them before they are, they can change their mind."

Akane's lips quirked. "That's very true, Ranma. Tell me, how long has it been since you visited me last? It seems to me you're a little more grown-up."

Ranma shrugged. "I dunno. Awhile, I guess." He realized he was fingering his hair.

She peered at him. "Not all that long. But you already speak very differently."

"I talk a lot in the Valley," Ranma said, realizing it, himself. It wasn't like Ranma had been _shy_, really, before… it was more that he was usually focussed on the next training technique, or helping his daddy find a safe spot to camp, or finding food, or smiling in that right way that got treats out of the vendors and old ladies who felt sorry for him, and maybe even he faked talking a little bit babyish, sometimes, because that always helped. Weird, he guessed, but he quickly dismissed it with a shrug. "Guess practice makes perfect," he told Akane, who smiled.

"And Ryoga? Has he wandered off, yet?"

Ranma frowned, a nasty feeling blossoming in his guts. "Leave? Why would Ryoga leave?"

A variety of emotions chased themselves across the young ghost's face, as though there were a bunch of answers she wanted to give, all at once. Ranma clamped his mouth shut and waited for the one she'd decide to give.

"You haven't noticed that Ryoga has trouble finding his way?" she prodded, gently.

Ranma thought back hard, but shook his head. "Sometimes he isn't where I left him," he said, remembering seeing Ryoga by the vegetable patch one minute, but then he somehow arrived back at the cottage before Ranma. "But that doesn't mean I can't find him and he can't find me."

Akane shook her head. "That's very different from the way I remember it, Ranma." But then she smiled, slow. "Why, he must have solved the problem, somehow."

Ranma thought it was a little weird how his iinazuke could know all the future and all the past and still get confused about something easy like that. "Don't you know everything?"

"Of course not!" Akane laughed. "Remember when I said, 'there is a world' where you're engaged to Shampoo? This is no longer the world I come from, Ranma. In my world, you never met my spirit, or at least sure never told me you did."

Ranma scooted back from the ledge to lean on his elbows, palms cupping his chin. "I don't really get it," he admitted. "So the world isn't your world, right?"

Akane nodded. "So it would seem."

"So how come you're still around? How come you remember things different?"

The raven-haired girl stared. "What are they feeding you over there?"

"Lotsa greens, and rutabegas, and river fish," Ranma answered promptly. "Mostly little ones."

Akane threw back her head and laughed. "I only mean that I don't know that there are a lot of kids your age who could put all that together."

The redhead nodded, solemn. "Elder Cologne says I'm very good at maths. Also at logic puzzles. Shampoo can't hold a candle to me with a problem." Ranma frowned. "But she sure picks up Japanese like nobody's business. My Chinese still sucks."

Akane doubled over giggling, which was kind of cool to watch, because she still did it in mid-air, legs scissoring upwards, bending over her shaking belly. "Now I know it's another world!" she said.

"I came to ask you for advice. About not getting engaged over an' over. What should I do?"

Akane's merriment faded pretty quickly at this. "Well, Ranma, it's simple. You've got to be honest. So many times, you tried to spare Shampoo's or Ukyo's or Kodachi's feelings, and –"

Ranma rolled onto his back and flopped down in despair. "You mean there's _another one_?"

Akane flew up to hover just over Ranma's prostrate form. "I'm afraid so. She's the only one I think you might not be able to avoid. If she catches wind of the fact that there's a strong, male martial artist in town, she'll probably fall for you no matter what."

Ranma threw a freckled arm over his eyes and groaned.

"Anyhow, you've got to be consistent with a girl. If you say you're just friends, you've got to _always_ treat her in a friendly way. If you've got romantic interest in a girl, you treat her extra-special, make your interest clear. And if you've got _no_ interest in a girl for friendship _or_ romance, you've got to ignore her. You can't show interest so she feels better about it, then withdraw it. That sort of thing only makes people confused."

That was pretty much what Ranma thought, but it was nice to have his iinazuke say the same thing. It made him feel a little more secure in his answer. "I kind of treat everyone I like the same, though," Ranma observed. "Don't I?"

Akane sighed. "That's part of the problem, dear. Oh, goodness – 'dear'! I really have begun thinking of you as a little girl!"

Ranma guessed this was kind of like the 'sweetheart'; he could handle it. "That's okay. So I'll try to me more careful. And how do I win _your _heart?"

There was a long moment of silence. "…Eh?" Akane whispered.

"Well, of course you're the one I want to be my iinazuke," Ranma said, clasping his hands behind his back and rocking forward on his heels. "My one and only. So how should I win you over? You'd know better 'n anyone."

The ghost disappeared for a moment over the verge, and Ranma scrambled after. "Hey, Akane? Did I say something bad? I'm sorry!" He peered over the edge.

Akane came floating up, and her hands were over her mouth, tears gathered in her eyes. "Heh. Sorry. No, you said something very right." She wiped the tears from under her eyes. "It's just… that's very nice of you to say, Ranma."

"Thank you." Ranma paused. He wanted Akane's answer very badly, but he had the feeling if he pressed her, she'd go into hiding again just like before.

Eventually, the ghost settled down and smiled at him again, even if it was through tears. "Getting me to love you is simple, Ranma. You'll do well if you're polite to me, at least at first, but in the end I'll love you because of who you are. Besides thinking before you speak, there's really nothing you could change about yourself that could make me like you more."

Ranma frowned. "Really? I don't have ta fight anyone for your hand, like in the stories?"

Akane blanched. "Well… there's some of that. But it's not the fighting that makes me love the man you grow into, Ranma. I really grow up to like… you. Even with your faults, and with mine."

That was relieving, in a way, Ranma decided, but it was also sort of scary. Being true to himself, he was realizing, was a pretty tall order. Ryoga was himself without trying; Elder Cologne was herself without trying. Wan Da might be the woman most herself out of anyone Ranma had ever met. But Ranma was still discovering himself, in every turn of the little stream that ran through the Valley, in the clouds in the sky and the earth beneath his feet. He learned more every time he spoke to someone new, or talked about something new to someone beloved. What if the turns he took between now and then made him into somebody Akane wouldn't love? What if he became someone she couldn't even like?

"Whatever it is," Akane's ghost said, "I order you to stop it. I've only just said how clever you're becoming. It isn't a bad thing," she soothed.

"I got the rutabega riddle yesterday," Ranma agreed.

"And I'm sure that's very impressive," Akane said. "Don't worry about being yourself. In the end, who else could you be?"

Ranma thought this very wise.

"You'd best be getting back home," Akane said. "The sun is much lower than when we first started speaking. And Ranma…" she said, as Ranma scrambled to his feet, "…don't come again. You already know so much about your life in Nerima, it worries me… just a little. Besides, the Springs are dangerous. You can always call on me if you need me," she added, then dissipated into a bright mist and flew back down to the Springs.

Ranma gulped. Talking to Akane, he'd forgotten all about the lies he'd told to get here, and how much trouble he'd be in when he returned. Not to mention that Akane was right: the sun was low. And in all his plans to use the Springs' call to get here, he hadn't planned on how he was going to get back.

He decided to try to use his rusty tracking skills to follow his own path back home. Perhaps he couldn't follow his path from weeks ago, but maybe he could follow his own footsteps from a few hours ago.

Half an hour later found Ranma backtracking a bit, feeling somewhat cheered. He'd followed his own footsteps at a steady pace the entire trip. He'd twice lost the trail, and twice found it again, and he was feeling pretty good about his chances of getting home in time to tell Shampoo he'd misunderstood Wan Da or remembered that the important guests were coming later on. The shadows were lengthening, but Ranma knew he only had an hour or so more of travel before he would be home, and he was certain full dark would not fall before he reached it.

It was now, for the first time, that he heard someone calling his name. Ranma felt his face heat. _Oh, no._ He could tell: it was Ryoga's voice. Ryoga had gone looking for him.

Of course Ryoga had gone looking. Ranma felt a sinking sensation in his belly as he thought of Ryoga's disappointed face. Looking at Ryoga's face and _knowing_ he had done wrong caused such a knot of misery in his throat that it made it hard to breathe. He broke out into a run through the underbrush. "Ryoga!" he called.

"RANMA?"

"Ryoga, I'm here!" Ranma called, bursting out into a clearing.

Ryoga's look of wild horror changing to absolute relief made Ranma feel three times worse. Ryoga opened his arms and Ranma flew into them.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry," Ranma babbled.

"Okay, it's all right," Ryoga said, "it's just that we're going to have to be very quiet…"

"What is it?" Ranma whispered, drawing back out of the embrace.

"We are being watched right now," Ryoga said quietly. "I don't want you to look around. I want you to keep on looking at me, all right, Ranma?"

Ranma gazed into Ryoga's features and nodded. "Who is it?" he asked.

"It could be my imagination," Ryoga said, "but let's keep playing quiet until we're sure."

Ranma nodded. "Can you make your door?" he whispered.

"I'm going to try," Ryoga said, but then four men burst out of the trees and attacked, all at once.

The four men were ugly, Ranma thought dizzily, as though they were trying to look like animals to be scarier. Ranma thought it was working pretty well.

Ryoga shoved Ranma behind him and fought.

And _how _he fought…

Ranma came to the realization that he had never really seen Ryoga fight… not for real. Now that these beast-men were here and fighting him, Ryoga didn't just battle, he _flew_. He leaped higher than any of the Juketsuzoku could leap, he punched one of the animal-men, who sailed ten meters through the jungle, he flipped and kicked in mid-air, and kept such a deadly focus that Ranma barely recognized his face. To his own surprise, a small measure of fear accompanied the awe and pride Ranma felt in Ryoga.

The animal-men were a stubborn bunch, though. One of them got a kick into Ryoga's ribs, and Ranma squeaked in horror and shared pain, but Ryoga shook it off as though he received such punishment all the time. "Get away from him!" Ranma shouted, and managed to kick the offender in the shins.

Ryoga scooped Ranma up and tucked him under one arm, continuing to fight one-handed. "Don't mind my little sister," he growled, "she doesn't know my own strength."

"But your little sister is just why we're here," one of the animal-men said, the one with the boar whiskers. "We're always looking for new wives for our clan, and she's at the perfect age. A little sour now, maybe, but she'll ripen soon."

Ranma let out a scream of rage and managed another hook kick, this time in boar whiskers' face.

Ryoga's own face contorted with rage. "You truly are animals," was all he said, however, and redoubled his attack. When one of the animal men skirted too close, he tossed Ranma high into the air. Ranma grabbed for the branches above him and scrambled atop one, far above the fray.

"Let me down!" Ranma called. "I can help!"

"Ranma, stop distracting me and let me fight!" Ryoga shouted, which was funny, not the tone of voice Ranma was used to from Ryoga. It was almost like he was talking to someone else altogether.

One of the animal men was pointing a stick of bamboo at Ryoga, and an instant later an arrow was sticking out of Ryoga's neck. Ryoga toppled like a felled tree at their feet, first to his knees, then face forward onto the leaf-strewn earth of the wood.

Ranma screamed, leaning forward and almost falling out of her perch.

"Where'd she go?" one of the animal-men said, scratching the back of his neck in dumb consternation.

"Up there, you fool," the pig-man replied, pointing up. "Hello, little bird," he said to Ranma, waving one hand with a big, false smile. He had teeth like Ryoga's. Ranma found the similarity horrifying, the familiar turned sinister. "Why don't you perch a little lower?"

Down below, Ryoga began to twitch. Ranma felt tears drop off of his cheeks and saw them travel a great distance down to the ground. His brain felt like Kitten chasing her own tail and pouncing on it in circles, around and around. It was like the Pit all over again, but the bad things had treed him and were pacing like jaguars.

He tried to think like he had in the Pit, in that way that had saved his mind. Maybe these men weren't bad; maybe they didn't know any better. "I d-d-don't w-want to be a bride!" Ranma tried, watching as Ryoga's twitching became more violent. His teeth had to be shaking in his head.

The pig-man below laughed. "Don't be silly, little bird. Every girl wants to be a bride. It won't hurt for very long."

So much for that plan. Ranma racked his brains. It was a puzzle, just like one of Elder Cologne's:

_Four men are down below; you are in the tree above. One man below has a knife. Your friend is trapped down below with the men. _

Those puzzles always told you what items you had, so Ranma emptied his pockets.

_Four men are down below; you are in the tree above. One man below has a knife. Your friend is trapped down below with the men. You have a piece of string, a wad of gum, and rudimentary martial arts skills. Your friend has been poisoned._

"If you save my brother, I'll go with you willingly," Ranma offered.

"You'll come with us, willing or unwilling," the pig-man said.

"It doesn't hurt anything to save my brother," Ranma tried.

"I don't care one way or the other," the pig-man said.

"Do you really want to wait me out all day, all night?" Ranma asked, watching Ryoga's body shaking like a leaf in a high wind. "I can stay up here for a looong time. You'd get me eventually, sure, but don't you think that maybe you'd like this to go a little faster? If you give my brother the antidote, I'll come right down."

The other three animal-men seemed to think that over, but the pig-man shook his head. "Sorry, sweetheart," he said, and Ranma's stomach heaved at that name turned so _wrong_ in the other man's mouth, "but we haven't got the antidote."

"You're lying!" Ranma shouted. "That's stupid! What if you nick yourself?"

The four men stared at one another. To Ranma's disgust, it appeared they'd never thought of this.

Ranma hit himself in the forehead with an open palm. _Okay, what else, what else…_

Ranma would think, later, how it was funny that it was still his last instinct: "_HEELLLLPPP!_ HEEELLLLPPPP!"

"Easy there, little bird," the pig-man said, pointing his knife at Ryoga. "Keep singing and your brother dies all the faster."

"You're gonna kill him anyhow," Ranma said recklessly, but he also stopped shouting. Then, he remembered: _you can always call on me if you need me._ "A…Akane?"

Akane's ghost popped into existence at Ranma's side. "Why, hello, Ranma-dear… oh, _no_," she whispered.

"What the hell is _that_?" one of the animal-men shouted, pointing up at the tree.

"What the hell is _what_?" the pig-man growled, and Ranma wondered if Akane was visible to everybody.

"That!"

Ranma turned to find that Akane's face had _changed._ The beautiful features he knew were sagging and blue-green, her eyes sunken, her fingers like talons, long, yellow, curved. She flew down at the animal-men like a swooping bird of prey, and they scattered.

Ranma half-climbed, half-fell down the tree, tears blinding his eyes, to fall down at Ryoga's side. "Ryoga!" he shouted. "Ryoga!"

Ryoga was aware, at least, or aware enough to latch onto Ranma's features.

"Oh no, oh no," Ranma breathed. "I can't carry you and Akane can't carry you. You've got to go home, Ryoga."

Akane appeared at his side, her face back to the sweet dips and curves Ranma already knew so well. "Can you do that, Ryoga?" she inquired, voice sweet. "Can you go home, and take Ranma with you?"

Ryoga nodded, teeth chattering. A blue door appeared just beside them, side-to-side instead of up-and-down.

"You're going to have to roll him, Ranma," Akane advised. "I can't help you, and I don't think he can do it, himself. Push hard, now."

Ranma managed to flip Ryoga over once, onto his back, and then again, onto his stomach.

"Just one more, Ranma. Go on ahead – you can do it!"

Ranma heaved with all his strength, and Ryoga disappeared through the blue doorway. Ranma rolled right on after him, and the blue doorway disappeared behind them.

But when Ranma picked up his head, he knew he was not in the Valley where he'd thought. Grass – the cultivated kind, the _city_ kind – covered every surface. There was a small pond, complete with koi and a bamboo fountain filled and tipped to crack against a nearby rock. A dojo sat before Ranma, a house behind.

A _house_.

"HELP!" Ranma shouted, at the top of his lungs. "HEELLLPPP!"

A girl came running out of the dojo, saw Ryoga and pressed her hands to her mouth. "Oh, no!" she exclaimed.

"Get Elder Cologne!" Ranma said, in desperation. He knew he was not in the Valley, but maybe, just maybe these people knew the Elder. "Ryoga, Ryoga, no," he said, hugging Ryoga across the ribcage. "No… no… no…" he cried.

Ryoga seemed past knowing him. He was staring sightlessly up, as though contemplating the clouds. Ranma searched his face for recognition, and, finding none, clapped both hands to his mouth. He felt like he might throw up all over Ryoga, and that would be even worse, wouldn't it, if it could get any worse, that would be the way to make it worse, and Ryoga's breaths were coming far, far apart, now, and they sounded like they rattled. Ranma counted to keep himself occupied, because he needed to tell his brain to do something that wasn't to repeat Ryoga's name over and over and also _no _and _no_ and _my fault_. He couldn't do that, yet. Elder Cologne was on her way, and the Elder might need to know how Ryoga was breathing. And so Ranma counted.

"One… t-two… three… f-f-four… five… six…"

"Out of the way, child!"

Ranma fell back, eyes wide at the sight of beloved Elder Cologne, kneeling at Ryoga's side.

"Who did this? Who did this, young lady?"

"I-it w-was… _animal men_," Ranma babbled, wondering if he sounded as crazy as Old Mai, who lived in the wood outside of the Village and refused to talk to anyone but her cats. "They blew a dart! They said they didn't carry the antidote! You told me _always_ carry the antidote!"

Elder Cologne nodded, and quickly began to grind up herbs in a mortar she pulled from a satchel around her shoulder, though it wasn't the mortar that Ranma recognized as hers.

"Do you need anything, Elder?" Ranma said. "Water? Do you need water? _Atsaui_ kelp? There's some in the pond!"

"Thank you, dear, some water would be helpful."

"I'll show her," said a very familiar voice.

Ranma looked up in surprise to see that there were many people out on the lawn, clustered around Ryoga, and that one of them was _Akane_. Akane, real, _live_ Akane. And finally he understood just where he was. Ryoga had taken him _home_, his home-to-be. It was only when Akane had taken his hand and led him to fetch water for Ryoga that Ranma's brain caught up.

He snuck a look at her as they made their way back to the yard and presented Elder Cologne with her water. It wasn't Akane's ghost, because Ranma could feel her hand in his, and it was _warm_. But it wasn't the right Akane, because the right Akane wouldn't be a grown-up girl… she'd be the same age as he was...

Elder Cologne fed Ryoga the herbal concoction. At first, the shaking caused it to sputter right back up again, but the Elder rubbed Ryoga's throat until he swallowed, and the trembling eased.

Ranma, on seeing the Elder put all her tools away, threw himself into her lap. "Thank you, Elder, thank you," he whispered against her robes, and then, to his utter consternation, burst into tears all over again.

"All right, all right now, little one, it's over now," Elder Cologne said. "He will recover."

Ranma gave a few sniffles until he felt he could control himself, then drew back and looked around. Many grown-ups were looking at him curiously, and he felt the urge to duck his head back against Elder Cologne's robes, but resolved not to be such a baby. Anyhow, one of the people staring was his Akane, even if she was years older than him. There was the girl who'd come out first, and another girl, both of whom looked enough like Akane that they'd have to be her sisters. Elder Cologne was there, and...

Ranma's mind reeled. Was that _Shampoo_? She'd sure grown up… in lots of places. But maybe it was, like… Shampoo's older sister? Who looked just like Shampoo, only taller and more… um, _taller_?

But it was when Ranma caught sight of the last mystery guest that his brain threatened to shut down entirely. A young man was perched on the dojo roof, peering down with a perplexed look painted across his face. He had messy, dark hair tied back in the sort of style Ranma's daddy used to plait Ranma's own hair. He had big, grey, almost feminine eyes surrounded by thick lashes… and kind of delicate features… but he was otherwise very strong-looking, with broad shoulders and big biceps. "Wow, old lady," he said. "Is she one o' yours?"

"It would appear so," Elder Cologne said, shooting Ranma a look that ordered him to play along. "Are you from the village of the Juketsuzoku?" she asked.

Ranma nodded eagerly. "Yes, Elder," he said. "Don't you know me?" _Don't you remember me?_

"Of course," the Elder said at length. "You must be… Ma Ra, am I right?"

Ranma nodded again. "Yup," she said carefully. "That's me." She looked up at the figure on the roof and met the Elder's eyes again.

"And how did you come upon Ryoga in such dire straits?" one of the sisters asked in a bored voice. "If he was targeted by the Musk, we have to think about why they were in Nerima."

"Why's _anybody_ in Nerima?" said the boy atop the roof in a voice that matched the girl's for boredom. "To chase _me_, 'course."

That seemed to start the boy and Akane bickering for some reason; to Ranma's surprise, nobody stopped them. If he and Shampoo were to bicker that way, Elder Cologne would separate them, and Wan Da would put them to such hard chores that they truly wanted and needed one another's help again.

"Mara, would you like to come in and have some tea?" the tallest daughter asked Ranma.

"Only if Ryoga can be inside, too," Ranma said. He didn't want to let Ryoga out of his sight until he was well again. Maybe not even then.

"Oh, Ranma-kun?" the tall daughter called. "Would you please bring Ryoga-kun inside?"

"Yeah, Ranma, you haven't even asked what's wrong with him," Akane said. "It's almost like you're not friends at all!"

"Yeah, yeah, whatever," Ranma said. "Sure thing, Kasumi!" he tacked on, slinging Ryoga over his shoulder and leaping to the top of the roof.

Ranma watched them go, pressing his hands to his mouth. Until Kasumi had called the boy 'Ranma', he could almost believe that the other boy was just someone who looked a whole lot like him. After all, it couldn't _really _be the same Ranma. Not this rude, brash, _mean –_

"He's in the bed, Akane, so unless you want me to fluff his pillows –"

"I just want you to show a little human kindness! Ryoga almost died –"

"_Human_ kindness, ha," the older Ranma said, hands on his hips. "Ask me to show that to a _human being_, then, and not a pig."

"Ranma, you _idiot_!"

And then, Akane did a strange thing:

She hit Ranma.

She hit him as hard as Ryoga hit the animal-men, so that he flew back many meters. Ranma looked around at the grown-up faces around him.

No one seemed surprised. Kami-sama. She could have at least given him a warning.

"Come along, then, dear, and let's have some tea," Kasumi repeated.

"Elder?" Ranma whimpered. He wasn't sure _do NOT leave me with these lunatics_ could be passed by way of his eyes, but he did his best.

"There, there, child. I'll stay with you, of course. How long have you been… in town?"

Ranma let himself be led through the expensive home and seated himself at the low table while Kasumi-san bustled in the kitchen. "Um… not… long?"

Elder Cologne nodded. "And how long do you plan on staying?"

Shampoo, sticking to the Elder's side, said, "who is girl, Great-grandmother? Shampoo does not remember – oof!"

It appeared as though Elder Cologne might have elbowed Shampoo in the guts.

"Until… Ryoga can take me back."

"Sorry, kid," said the older Ranma, coming into the house through the back door, "but there's no chance of that. Ryoga can't find his way outta a paper bag."

Ranma didn't respond, because he didn't want to be rude, and he had a feeling anything he said would be very rude. He clasped his hands in his lap and looked down.

Kasumi came in from the kitchen to pour the tea. Ranma was very grateful for something to do with his hands. He sipped the tea, slowly, while the others stared.

"So, allow me to introduce your kind hosts," Elder Cologne said, once they were all settled. "You have been welcomed into the Tendo household. The young lady serving is Miss Kasumi Tendo. The young lady at her right is her younger sister, Miss Nabiki Tendo. The youngest, letting off some steam in the dojo, if my ears don't deceive me, is Miss Akane Tendo. Saotome Ranma, their guest, across from Nabiki Tendo. And of course, you know Shampoo and myself from the village."

Ranma bowed his head. "Very pleased to meet you," he said.

"Wow, Cologne," Ranma said, "what's all the formal stuff for?"

"You may not recognize a gently-bred child, Ranma," Elder Cologne said, "but I can spot one a mile away." She turned her attention to the younger Ranma. "You have been very brave, child, coming with Ryoga all this way."

Ranma didn't feel very brave: not so much like a Man Amongst Men or even a Woman Amongst Women. He felt, instead, the creeping guilt that had first plagued him at Ryoga's side. If Ryoga hadn't gone looking for him, they would still be together in the Valley. Shampoo would be the right age, and Ranma would have been fighting with her, or playing, or learning some new skill, solving some new puzzle. Now, because Ranma had been selfish, had wanted to know things he shouldn't have known... because he had lied and disobeyed... he was stuck here until Ryoga was better.

Ranma had no illusions: no one could be that sick and get up the next morning all better… not even Ryoga. Even the scratches Ranma'd got from the kitties in the Pit had taken a long time to heal, and it was many days before Ryoga wanted to let him start fighting again. What Ryoga had just been through… it was a lot worse. He might never be really better and that was all Ranma's own fault.

"Oh, dear, she's crying!" Kasumi exclaimed.

Ranma wiped at his cheeks. "Sorry," he said. "I don't feel very brave. It's my fault Ryoga was hurt. He went looking for me."

"Whoa, kid, take it easy," Ranma said, leaning forward and offering his napkin. "It ain't your fault. It's probably dumb ol' Ryoga's. He was probably lost, that's all, like always. Don't cry."

Ranma looked up into his own large, grey eyes, wide with empathetic suffering and nodded. _Wow. Maybe not so bad, after all._ "Thanks, even if it's not true," Ranma managed, drying his eyes on the napkin.

"So how'd you meet Ryoga, anyhow?" Ranma asked. "If he wasn't lost, how'd he know to look for you in the first place?"

Ranma wasn't sure how to answer him. If he said that they'd been with the Juketsuzoku, the others would ask how Ryoga had managed to get here so fast, and Ranma wasn't sure that Ryoga's secret of creating doors was his to tell. At the same time, he didn't want to lie to his future in-laws. Being himself was very imporant, Akane'd said so, and so that meant he should try to be truthful as much as he could. "Ryoga saved me," Ranma compromised.

"From the animal-men?" Elder Cologne asked gently.

Ranma nodded.

"But you said he was already looking for you," Nabiki Tendo said. "You knew him before then."

Ranma fiddled with his teacup. "Yeah. Yes. Before that, too. Ryoga's saved me twice. And he's… been looking after me." Ranma couldn't call Ryoga his brother or his father or his uncle, so he'd found a thing to say that seemed to satisfy the villagers: _Ryoga is looking after me._ It made it sound like it was just for a little while, which Ranma didn't like so much; but it was true, wasn't it? Ryoga was only looking after him for now, and then he'd be reunited with his daddy.

"Ryoga?" Ranma snorted. "The idea of Ryoga looking after a kid is…" He paused, scratched his nose. "Strike that. I can see it. I'll bet he did a good job, too."

Ranma looked up at him. He guessed he saw how Akane grew to like this Ranma. He seemed brash and annoying at first, but he could be nice, too, and the nice could catch you off-guard.

"But where are your mother and father?" Kasumi inquired.

"Ma Ra has no mother or father," Elder Cologne said. "She is looked after by the village as a whole."

The faces around the table immediately shifted to sympathy – except for Shampoo, who frowned – and Ranma lowered his gaze to duck under it. He knew the Elder had his best interests in mind, but the lie was still scary, because it was so big. Ranma had a living mom and a living daddy, although they were somewhere else out of reach.

"D'you suppose she's related to the girl who drowned?" Nabiki asked.

"Huh? What girl Nabiki talk about?" Shampoo asked.

"Surely you've noticed the resemblance," Nabiki offered. "Bright gold hair, blue eyes with those features…"

Ranma shrugged. "I just figured her hair was 'cause all the Juketsuzoku are like that," he offered. "Y'know, with the colors. But come to think of it, she does look a little like my cursed form."

"In fact," Nabiki said. She stood, holding her cup of tea, then splashed little Ranma full in the face.

"Nabiki!" Kasumi exclaimed. "That was extremely rude!"

Ranma wiped the dripping tea out of his eyes and looked down. Sure enough, he had reverted to his boy side. The older Ranma was gaping at him, speechless.

"I _am_ Saotome Ranma," Ranma said, miserably. "And I'm very sorry about this."

* * *

A/N: HIIII, everyone! So sorry for the long delay. I ended up trapped in a car for many hours as I rooooddde to see my sister with others in the driver's seat. What emerged was 9,000 words of Ranma and 9,000 words of HP!

I can't help but notice common themes. Both stories were stopped because I needed to write a fight scene, and I am terrified of fight scenes. I'm always worried they'll sound too dry to be convincing. Then, both have characters who are injured - and Ryoga is really beginning to occupy the same headspace as Ron, for me - at least THIS Ryoga and SoS!Ron, anyhow. Both strong, volatile, loyal types. Not to mention people being confronted with another aspect of themselves - one which seems to have done better or worse than the canon character.

Ranma has no HP self, unless it's Draco Malfoy. Which part of me finds hysterical.

In any case, hope you like it! And if you're worried about another long hiatus, all I can do is say 'sorry' and tell you that there's another half-chapter already written.

Let me know what you think!

-K


	8. Above

Chapter Eight: Above

* * *

"Huh… _wha_…?" the older Ranma sputtered.

Ranma didn't blame him. It was beyond weird to stare at his older self.

"Whoa!" Nabiki exclaimed. "I wasn't expecting…" She leaned forward to peer at Ranma.

"What're you playing at, kid?" Ranma growled, leaning forward, eyes turning suspicious. "Did Ryoga put you up to this?"

"Put me up to _looking like you_?" Ranma replied, bewildered. A scary thought occurred to him. "Hey… is there a Spring of Drowned Ranma somewhere?"

"No, dear, of course not," said Elder Cologne. She sighed. "As much as I was trying to help you avoid this –"

"Great-grandmother _know_?" Shampoo squeaked.

"…perhaps you should start from the beginning and tell us just how you came to be here."

"And who he is!" Ranma added.

"Don't be silly, Son-in-law," Elder Cologne said. "He's Saotome Ranma, like he says."

Kasumi returned from the kitchen to hand Ranma a towel to mop the tea off his face. He liked her more and more. "I didn't lie," Ranma said. "Except about the name. Ryoga took me here by mistake when he got h-hit with the dart."

"_Ryoga took me here by mistake_, he says," Nabiki caroled. "Like Ryoga went to the wrong shopping mall instead of the wrong _reality_."

Ranma looked up at Nabiki. She was pretty quick, he decided. He wasn't sure if he trusted her or not, but she seemed miles faster than anyone else at the table but Elder Cologne.

"Is that right, child? Did you end up so far off your chosen path?" the Elder asked.

Ranma nodded. "It's my fault. Me an' Akane told Ryoga _home_ and this is what he thought of. Not the Village." Ranma frowned. Ryoga had never felt like he belonged in the Village, really, not like Ranma did. No wonder when he was hurting so bad, he thought _home_ meant here, instead.

"From the beginning, child," Elder Cologne advised again.

"Better go get 'Kane," Ranma said with a deep sigh. "She's gonna wanna hear this." He pushed himself up from the table and, with the air of a man going to the gallows, made for the dojo.

Ranma waited. Kasumi freshened his tea. He sipped it and avoided everyone's eyes. Kasumi seemed pitying, which was bad. Nabiki looked… greedy, which was worse. Shampoo looked smug. He didn't know what any of that meant, and that made him even more nervous than before. "How long until Ryoga wakes up?" he asked Elder Cologne.

"Ryoga is very strong," the Elder replied, smoothing her robes. "I believe he will recover, but it may take some time."

Ranma hung his head again, but then Akane entered, wearing a yellow gi, and he perked up. He was glad to see her, alive and warm and breathing. "Akane!" he exclaimed.

The blank look she gave in reply was worse than a slap to the face. "Wow," she said to the grown-up Ranma, "he really does look just like you!"

"Tell 'er, kid," Ranma said.

"I _am_ him. I'm Saotome Ranma." _And I'm gonna marry you when I grow up._

Akane blinked. "Ah…" Akane let her eldest sister settle her into a seat, and then Ranma began his story.

He began it with the cats. He guessed he could have started with Ryoga finding him, but he talked about the cats anyhow. They had to know how bad the cats were, being in that Pit with the cats, for them to know how important it was that Ryoga had found him. He even told them how he had argued with Ryoga about staying, and how silly and… almost crazy that sounded, now. He told them about finding the Village, and Elder Cologne cleaning up his cuts. He showed them the scar where his stitches had been. He told them about meeting Wan Da and Shampoo and learning Chinese and mathematics and meeting Akane-the-ghost. Getting the girl-body, with its long, carroty eyelashes and big blue eyes and way of looking at things. And finally, he told them about the four animal-men at the base of the tree, calling him _little bird._

"So as far as you are concerned, you belong to the Village," Elder Cologne said. "You are one of the Juketsuzoku?"

Ranma shook his head. "I belong here, Elder. Ryoga always said he was going to take me here. To meet up with my father."

There was a long silence at the table. A grown-up silence, one Ranma couldn't interpret.

"Hey, kid," Ranma finally said to him. "Let's go for a walk."

Ranma looked to the Elder, who nodded, and stood. Together, he and Ranma moved to the koi pond and sat by the stones.

"Hey, shrimp," Ranma said. "You know, the thing about Pops is, sometimes he's kind of an idiot."

Ranma frowned. "Don't talk about our daddy that way," he admonished.

"No, listen," Ranma said. He scratched the back of his head. "Darn it, I'm not really good with this stuff. What I mean is, my daddy – er, Pops – he put me in that Pit, too."

Ranma's eyes widened. "Really? Did Ryoga come get you, too?"

He cleared his throat. "See, that's the thing. My _Pops_ pulled me out every night. He put me back in, mind, each morning," he said hastily, at Ranma's wide eyes. "But after three days, he figured the technique was a failure. He, er… cleaned me off and treated me real nice for a few days."

Ranma's voice lowered to a whisper. "He took you out… and put you back in... three times?"

"Yeah," Ranma replied, with a self-conscious wince. "Pretty bad, huh? But… he took me out."

There was a silence while Ranma absorbed this. "M-my daddy… d-didn't come g-get me," he managed.

"Exactly. And that's the thing, see?" Ranma returned. "Because Pops may be an idiot, but he's not a monster. Let's say he really wanted to get rid of you. Y'know how many times people offered to take me in when I was your age? Like, every couple o' months, right? Would've been easy. He wouldn't've left you there on purpose. Which means…"

Ranma clapped both hands over his mouth and shook his head. "No! He's waiting for me here in Nerima. Ryoga said!"

"Of course Ryoga said," Ranma replied, voice low. "He would've said anything to get you outta that Pit, is what I'm thinking."

Ranma knew this was nothing less than the truth, and the betrayal stung. But then he felt bad about being angry with Ryoga because Ryoga was upstairs in bed, hurt on his account, and all the feelings meshed together and exploded into a wail.

Ranma leaned forward and patted him on the back, gingerly.

Ranma responded by falling into his arms and squishing him.

They hung together that way for a long moment before the older Ranma's arms fell around him, settling there very carefully, as though he was made of spun glass. Or as though the older Ranma wasn't used to hugs, not at all. "Okay," Ranma said. "I ain't about to say it's all right or nothin', 'cause it's not, but you can let it all out. Nobody's here to see."

Ranma couldn't care less if the entire world was looking; he wanted to scream, he wanted to shout, he wanted to pound something into dust, and he didn't care if he had an audience. He wanted to cry forever. Eventually, though, the tears dried up, and he withdrew.

Older Ranma's tang was all tear-stained and snotty. "Sorry," Ranma said, wiping ineffectually.

"Hey, this shirt's seen worse," Ranma replied. "Are you ready to go back inside?"

Ranma nodded, and wrapped his arms around his counterpart's neck.

Older Ranma gave him a funny look, but scooped him up the way Ryoga did, and after some hesitancy, placed him at his hip. "Is that okay?" he asked.

Ranma nodded and buried his face in the other boy's tang.

"Um… all right, then," Ranma replied, and headed for the house.

* * *

Ranma awoke with a start and cast about his unfamiliar surroundings. It was only after he'd elevated to a full panic that he remembered where he was and why.

He was lying on a bedroll in a small room; another bedroll was pushed up against the wall. He rose and wiped at his eyes, which were gritty with sleep and tears, and went in search of Ryoga.

He found the kitchen, first - the spare room seemed to be close to it - and when he pricked up his ears, he could hear talking.

"Of course he's fond of Ryoga, Ranma," Akane's voice sounded. "Ryoga looked after him when he was hurt and alone. Just because _you_ don't like Ryoga…"

"That's just it. _I _don't like Ryoga," Ranma's voice said. There was a pause. "But I like the kid."

"Of course you like the kid," came Nabiki's dry, laughing tone, like she thought the whole lot of them were ridiculous. "A narcissist like you has to be loving this."

"That kid ain't me!" Ranma retorted. "He's like the old ghoul was sayin'… 'gently bred'. Ryoga's spoiled him, and no mistake. Not to mention living with the Amazons, where a guy might as well be a girl. He ain't as tough as I was, at that age."

"Ranma," Nabiki said, "no one should be as 'tough' as you were at that age."

There was a bit of quiet.

"Yeah, well… maybe not," Ranma allowed. "Maybe I… kind of owe Ryoga."

"Big," Akane emphasized.

"Yeah, all right, _big_, then," Ranma shot back. "But don't you think maybe that's why he did all this?"

"Saotome, I am shocked," Nabiki said. She didn't sound shocked; she sounded as amused as ever. "Has even your innocence been lost?"

"Aw, stuff it, Nabiki. I'm just sayin', a guy taking care of his biggest rival? Don't tell me you haven't thought of some kinda motivation for it all. And when'd this power of his show up? How long has he been able to… _make a door_?"

"That is a little odd," Akane allowed. "You'd think you'd have used an advantage like that… when you were having one of your little matches."

"One of our little…" Ranma choked.

"Akane has a point. Listen to me, _Akane has a point, _what a novelty. Ryoga's ability has got to be a new thing."

"I'll thank you not to be insulting," Akane said. "You're being included in this conversation, after all, so don't act like you're doing us a favor."

Ranma crept past them and made for the stairwell.

"I think I hear an interloper in our midst," Nabiki said.

"I'm just going upstairs to check on Ryoga," Ranma replied, but then he peered into the kitchen.

Ranma, Akane, and Nabiki were all standing in the cheery, yellow kitchen. Ranma was leaning backwards, his elbows resting on the countertop. Nabiki was perched on the counter itself, and Akane was facing them, arms crossed over her chest.

"Hello, Ranma," Akane said kindly, her expression lightening. "Did you have a good rest?"

"I don't remember falling asleep," Ranma said, cautious.

"You fell asleep… in my arms," Ranma replied, looking very uncomfortable.

"Oh, get over it," Nabiki exclaimed. "You, too, were once a child. We get it."

"S'weird," Ranma muttered, wrapping his arms around himself.

"Where are Elder Cologne and Shampoo?"

Akane spoke up, crouching down a bit, hands on knees, so she could look into his face. "They don't live here, Ranma, but they do live close by. They went home."

"Ryoga could make a door when I met him," Ranma offered.

"Huh?"

"He made a door straight from the Pit to the Village, the day I met him. So he's been able to do that for a long time." Ranma still wasn't sure how long, so… "…at least two seasons."

The grown-ups exchanged a telling look. "But that means he's been hopping between here and there all along," Nabiki said. "I mean, it's been awhile since we've seen Ryoga, but not _that_ long, am I right?"

"He was here this month," Ranma said. "Challenging me again, so you bet he's been here. What could he've been thinking, just leaving me – er, him, whatever – with the old ghoul and skipping town?"

"I don't know, Ranma," Akane said. "He might be able to give us some answers when he wakes up."

Ranma glanced around the room, waiting for one of the grown-ups to understand, when it seemed so clear to him. When that didn't happen, he spoke up. "He's probably… not from here. The same way I'm not. I mean, if he could always make a door… or he's been able to a long time… then why should he be _your_ Ryoga? He could be from anyplace."

"Wow, Ranma," Nabiki said, leaning forward and peering at the younger boy, "I think he's smarter than you."

"Hey!" Ranma protested. "I resent that!"

"Just out of curiosity, little Ranma," Nabiki went on in that voice of hers that Ranma was liking less and less, "this 'Elder Cologne' of yours, did she teach you lessons?"

"Yes," Ranma said, cautious.

"In what?"

Ranma frowned, not understanding why this was important now. "Reading and writing. And maths. And logic. And medicine. And Wan Da taught me tracking, and plants. And Ryoga was training me in martial arts."

"For two seasons. Let's say, six months."

"I guess."

"And are you better, now, in all those things than when you started learning?"

"Of course! If I weren't, I wouldn't have been learning!"

"Of course," Nabiki echoed. "Maybe you'll show us one of these logic puzzles later, and we'll see if your big brother here can solve it."

"Let's go up and visit Ryoga for now," Akane said, shooting her sister a look and offering Ranma her open palm.

Ranma nodded, and clasped his hand in hers. Together, they ascended the stairs.

Akane opened a door with a duck on it that said 'Akane'. So, she'd offered Ryoga her own bed – Ranma's heart warmed. He really liked Akane, even if she was a little violent.

When he saw Ryoga's form lying on her western-style bed, he ran on tip-toe to the side and peered across, palms pressed to the mattress. Ryoga was still white-pale, and an occasional tremor shook his body, but it was so much better than the violent shaking he'd been doing before. Ranma took in a grateful gasp of air, and breathed more easily than he could remember since being tossed up into the branches of that tree. "Ryoga," he said. "Ryoga, Ryoga."

"Easy, kid, he needs his sleep," Ranma said, placing a hand flat atop Ranma's head. "He still doesn't look so good." He removed his hand kind of fast, and looked at his palm like it didn't quite belong to him.

"Come on, little Ranma," Akane said, "and you can show me one of those puzzles, okay? Ranma doesn't have to try to solve it if he doesn't want to."

"Hey, I ain't gonna let some _kid _beat me," Ranma grouched, following them down the stairs and back into the kitchen, "even if it _is_ me."

"So let's see it, little Ranma," Nabiki said, perching herself on the kitchen counter again.

Ranma thought for a minute and decided it wouldn't do any harm to show off a _little. _"Okay," he said. "I'll show you an easy one. You've got room for six plants and they've got to be planted in a row, because you've only got the one strip of land that's yours. Squash and white beans are vines so they've gotta be where they won't choke the others. You want to plant some red beans, though, which are sturdier. The two rice plants grow best with beans on either side. Where should you put the rutabega plant?"

"That's the sort of problem that Elder Cologne would have you work on?" Akane said.

Ranma nodded. "It's the rutabega riddle. It's a real-life one. Some of the others the Elder makes up are more silly."

"Can you solve it?"

Ranma was getting ready to nod when he saw that Nabiki was looking up at the older Ranma. "Well, I figure even you'd need to hear it again, Nabiki," Older Ranma said.

"I'll write it down if you want," Ranma said. Akane handed him paper and a pencil and he wrote the riddle out as neatly as he could. Never mind that the Elder would never bother; she'd tell them a problem twice and then not repeat it again. He and Shampoo had long since learned to make things easier on themselves by Ranma memorizing the first half and Shampoo memorizing the second.

The older Ranma puzzled over the sheet Nabiki handed him, brow furrowing. "Where they won't choke the others… that's got to be on the edges. So… but you don't know which is which… but the rice plants have to have red beans and white on either side… but you still don't know which is which…"

"Maybe you should go to bed, little Ranma," Nabiki said. "He may be at this for awhile."

"Do _you_ know the answer, Nabiki-san?" Ranma innocently replied. "It's an easy one, right?"

"Well," Nabiki frowned, looking at the paper. "It's –"

"Don't say a word!" Ranma growled. "I've almost got it."

"Yeah, right, Ranma," Akane said. "We'll see you in the morning."

"Where will you sleep, Akane?"

Akane blushed. "Well, I mean… I was going to put Ryoga in the guest room, but I wasn't sure where you'd want to sleep…"

"Wherever Ryoga is," Ranma said. "He's going to want to know where I am."

Older Ranma exchanged a look with the two girls, then scrubbed the back of his neck. "Yeah, guess so. I'll get you a bedroll." He disappeared into the room where Akane'd woken up.

"And I'll just sleep in here," Akane said cheerfully, going into the guest room.

"Where am I supposed to sleep?"

"In the dojo?" Akane suggested. Her voice sounded a little _too _cheerful.

"Are you kickin' me outta my own room, tomboy?"

"I'm kicking you out of the room my family has so graciously allowed you to and your useless father to camp in like gypsies!"

Ranma crept around the arguing couple, up the stairs, and into Akane's room and closed the door. He peered at Ryoga in the bed, again, and sighed. He curled up in a bedroll at Ryoga's feet and fell right to sleep.

* * *

When Ranma awoke, it was with a start. He'd dreamed about Kitten, surrounded by bigger, older cats who wanted her for supper. They were carrying knives and forks and even though they were talking with cat-voices, Ranma could understand, and their language was dark and terrible. He woke panting heavily and decided he wanted a bath.

Then, he remembered all over again where he was. For a little while, his heart hammered in his chest and his pulse fluttered like a bird and his breaths came quick and light; but then he took breaths in for a count of three, and held for a count of three, and exhaled for a count of three. After a moment he was better, so he tip-toed over to Ryoga's bedside and peered down at the older boy's sleeping form.

Ryoga was panting lightly, with a sheen of sweat painted across his brow. Even standing this close to Ryoga, Ranma could feel the heat pouring off of him. Ryoga was running a bad fever.

Elder Cologne liked to take long walks through the woods, and sometimes Shampoo and Ranma would come along. She pointed out medicinal plants as they walked, and said what their characters were, and the conditions where they were used. Now, on top of the plants his daddy had taught him were good to eat, Ranma had memorized ten plants that were good for healing.

None were springing up in the Tendos' backyard, though, so Ranma got a cool cloth and pressed it to Ryoga's forehead. When that steamed dry in a few minutes, he went in search of a grown-up.

"Ranma!" he called. "Akane? Ranma-ue?"

Ranma appeared in the window outside, dangling upside down. "Ranma-_ue_?" he repeated, braid dangling down from his head and swishing in an errant breeze.

"Because you're older," Ranma said. "You know, 'Ranma-above-me'."

"In more ways than one," Ranma-ue said with a grin, flipping down through the open window to land in a crouch at Ranma's side. "What's up, kid?"

"Ryoga's very sick."

"We knew he'd be very sick," Ranma-ue agreed.

Ranma shook his head and tugged at Ranma-ue's sleeve. "No, his fever is very high. We have to put him in water."

Ranma-ue blinked a few times, then laughed. "Well, kid, if you say so. I sure hope his fever's high enough to make that water hot."

Ranma wasn't sure what this meant, but he'd already figured that Ranma-ue said a lot of things that he didn't understand. He followed Ranma-ue into Akane's bedroom and to Ryoga.

"Hey, porkchop!" Ranma-ue shouted, shaking Ryoga's shoulder.

Ryoga moaned and his head lolled to the side; he made no other motion or sound. Ranma had a hard time being anything but happy, even at this sign of weakness. He still remembered the shakes Ryoga had the day before. This fever seemed like nothing in comparison.

"Here, kid, help me out," Ranma-ue said, and Ranma pulled the blankets back off of Ryoga. Someone helpful had removed all of Ryoga's clothing but his boxer shorts. Ranma hoped it was Kasumi, who seemed like she wouldn't let embarrassment get in the way of making Ryoga as comfortable as he could be.

Ranma-ue picked Ryoga up in his very strong arms and carted him off to the furo. Together, they wiped Ryoga free of sweat and then Ranma-ue ran a cool bath around Ryoga.

"H-his fever must be really high," Ranma-ue said, suddenly looking a little bit nervous.

Ranma nodded, solemn. "The water will help bring it down," he said.

"So…" Ranma-ue said, scratching the back of his neck. Ranma-ue looked like he wanted to have another talk like the one about their daddy. Ranma wasn't sure he wanted to have another talk like that. He still felt raw from the first one.

"Your story from before," Ranma-ue went on, "it's just… I've got some questions. About Ryoga. That okay?"

Ranma looked up from underneath his lashes. "Guess so," he replied. He felt like he had just entered Elder Cologne's hut for the first time, but this time Ryoga wasn't there to give him the nod. Moreover, the worry in Ranma's eyes looked a lot like Wan Da's. He sighed and settled himself in for a long string of questions that insulted Ryoga's honor.

* * *

Standing on a streetcorner in some as-of-yet-unnamed, unknown Japanese city, Hibiki Ryoga sneezed violently.

"Must be one of those spring colds goin' around," a stranger said, handing him a handkerchief.

"Th-thank you," Ryoga stammered, accepting the gift. The stranger nodded and moved off down the street.

Sometimes, Ryoga would wander for months at a time without spotting one instance of human kindness. His life truly was a graveyard of buried hopes and dreams, teeming with the frustrated yearnings of –

Wait. Hadn't he been looking for someone? Hadn't he had a question he wanted to ask?

"Sir. Sir! Can you tell me the way to the Tendo Dojo?"

The stranger looked up in surprise. "The Tendos'? Sure thing, kid. Go down the block, then turn left and then turn left again…"

Ryoga's consternation must've been showing on his face, because the older man stumbled to a verbal halt. Perhaps it was the palpable depression chi that was beginning to rise from Ryoga's skin like heat from a fever. Only bluer, and also far more ominous.

"Well, that does seem a little complicated," the stranger allowed. "Hey, I'm going in that direction myself; you could just follow me."

Ryoga looked up in amazement. "Really? You'd do that?"

"Er… yeah, sure thing, kid," the stranger said, looking like he was already beginning to regret the offer.

Not that Ryoga noticed. _Wow_, he thought. _The gods really _can_ be good. Someone up there wants me to succeed. Prepare yourself, Ranma!_

Somewhere, the gods were laughing.

* * *

A/N: Well, yeah... so this is about half the size of the previous chapter, but the previous chapter was really an anomaly. Usually, my chapters in this fic are about this size, but I do apologize if you were disappointed in the shortness!

Deciding to call older Ranma 'Ranma-ue' is a decision made based off of a few things:

1) My love for 'Kaze Hikaru'. And this most primarily. I make no claims to logic.

2) The fact that a lot of the Japanese Ranma knows (especially the more obscure language) he learned from Elder Cologne, who learned Japanese a long time ago

3) To emphasize how respectful tiny!Ranma is to most everyone.

4) Because I learned from Geas of Gryffindor that OMG YOU MUST GIVE EVERYONE DIFFERENT BUT BELIEVABLE NAMES FAST. For the obvious reason that to do otherwise gets very confusing, very fast.

Basically, if you use the honorific '-ue' to describe someone older than you, it's very respectful (but not so much as 'sama' or even 'dono', I think) and a little out-of-date. I have a feeling that the Japanese girls who hear tiny!Ranma use '-ue' will think it is ADORABLE due to Ranma's age.

This is also the first POV shift we've had in this story. Up until now, it's been tiny!Ranma all the way. But I just *had* to switch to canon!Ryoga. I find him hysterical.

See you soon and let me know, as always, what you think. My favorite parts are when you **speculate on what's about to happen next**, because even if I don't use any of those ideas, it always gets the creative juices flowing!

-K


	9. Daddy

Nine: Daddy

* * *

Ranma was able to stay polite and blank-faced through Ranma-ue's interrogation – as though he hadn't told the whole story already – as though he hadn't told it over and over again. It was like Ranma-ue thought he was a liar, or else a baby who couldn't tell bad intentions from good.

His daddy'd told him, over and over, before he'd gone: _you can't trust anybody, Ranma, not anybody but your old man. The world's full of schemers and liars, Ranma, so you've just got to be the best schemer and liar there is. Anything Goes, eh?_

So he would've seen if Ryoga was one of those bad people. He would have known.

Ranma tried to tell himself that Ranma-ue didn't know this about him, but Ranma-ue had _been_ Ranma, in a way that made the younger boy's head hurt, and so he should have known better.

"I guess the porkchop's fever must be down, now," Ranma-ue said, trailing his fingers through the water. "It's…cold."

Ranma's elder counterpart had repeated this about the water three times. Ranma didn't ask why, just helped Ranma-ue haul Ryoga out of the bath and pat him dry before carrying him to Akane-san's room once more.

Then, Ranma heard a "_Tadiama!_" in a voice that tugged at his chest, twanging through his body like an electric shock. He was running, out of Akane's room and down the stairs before he thought, leaving Ranma-ue behind. "_Daddy!_" Ranma shrieked, and Genma scooped him up, and Ranma relaxed for what felt like the first time in _ages_. All the tension bled out of him in a way it only did for his daddy: not even Ryoga had this power to comfort Ranma and steady his world. But then, Genma let go. Ranma held on, but his daddy let go, and he was left hanging, deadweight, around the bigger man's neck.

"What?" said Genma. "Who is this?"

"It's me, pops," Ranma heard his older counterpart say from the stairwell. "Age seven."

"Even then you were a weak little girl," Genma observed.

Ranma dropped from Genma's neck to land on his feet, and swallowed hard. He _wasn't_ in girl form, so that meant he wasn't a Man Amongst Men – not a real man, like his daddy wanted.

It meant he'd failed.

"That's low, even for you, Pops," Ranma-ue said, a beat after a response should've come.

"What?" Genma said. "It's just another mirror clone or doppelganger, an' it'll be gone soon enough. Next, you'll be telling me your 'girl half''s your real sister," he shot over his shoulder, heading for the kitchen.

Ranma looked up at Ranma-ue, but the older boy wasn't looking at him. He was staring after their daddy, and blinking hard. Then, he pressed his eyes closed and shook his head, once, tight, like he was shaking something free. Then, "…he's drunk. That's all," without ever looking at Ranma.

Ranma said nothing. He felt as though his guts had been sliced to ribbons: the Catfist, from the inside. He ran up to his father's legs and paused just at the threshold of the kitchen, where wood met tile. He didn't want to try again; he was afraid of what he might feel if he tried again, if his daddy looked at him with those eyes that lit on him without seeing. Besides, Genma and another man had begun talking in the kitchen, laughing with big, scary, booming guffaws, interspersed with snatches of song with lyrics that made Ranma blush.

"C'mon, kid," Ranma-ue said, tugging Ranma by the shoulder. "Bedtime," as though nothing had happened. But Ranma lay in bed all night, falling asleep and jolting fast awake, and feeling very, very small.

The next day, Genma-san put an extra helping of rice onto Ranma's plate, but there was no forgetting something like the way his daddy's arms had gone slack and uncaring around him, the way Genma had, all casual indifference, called Ranma a failure. Ranma knew, because he wanted to, very badly, and could not. But Ranma-ue was acting like everything was normal, sparring over food and laughing with his father. _His, _and not Ranma's.

Ranma couldn't eat, because there was a thick lump in his throat, like he was sobbing or screaming, only he wasn't doing either one. Every time he tried to swallow, the rice got stickier and harder. He wanted some water to drink. He wanted Ryoga. He wanted Elder Cologne.

He excused himself from the table and walked out the front door.

Ranma walked swiftly down the pavement, and then he was running, just as fast as he could. He imagined what it would be like if Ryoga found him, lifted him up and gave him one of those hugs that squished him a little uncomfortably. Or if the Elder found him, took him back to the Neko Hanten and promised he could stay with her until Ryoga was better. That Ryoga could stay in a bed at their place, where Ranma could keep an eye on him. He nodded, resolute. That was best.

Better yet, he decided, heaving a sigh, why not wish they could all go home while he was at it? What was it that the Elder said? _If wishes were horses_…

But then, it seemed as though at least one of Ranma's wishes had come true. Ranma rubbed his eyes, because he was sure it couldn't be right. But there he was: Ryoga. Healthy. Awake. Alive! Ranma ranranran and _flung_ himself at the older boy, who caught at him, and swung him around with the force of Ranma's initial leap.

But when Ranma drew back, he gasped. This wasn't Ryoga's face, or not exactly. This boy was younger, and staring at him with frank bewilderment, and a lack of recognition that made Ranma's insides swirl like he had eaten rotten meat. This Ryoga was scanning the area for someone he _belonged to_, when his own Ryoga would know just where he belonged, and with whom. He hastily let go of Ryoga and slid down.

"I…I'm so sorry. I thought you were my father," Ranma babbled, which was ridiculous, Ryoga was a grown-up person, but not _that _grown up. He wasn't anybody's father.

Ryoga opened his mouth, casually, and Ranma knew he was going to receive another dismissal, he just _knew_ it. But then, the look in Ryoga's eyes changed, and he ducked to peer into the face of the smaller boy. "_R-Ranma_?"

Ranma gasped, or the small noise he issued started as a gasp, and ended up being more like a hiccough. And then a sob, as everything from the past few days flashed before him in a parade of sensory impressions: Ranma-ue's impatient _you-dupe_ face, Ryoga shuddering on the forest floor, the animal-men's greedy smiles, Genma's arms going limp and letting him slide away, the feel of Ranma-ue's hand pressing down on his shoulder.

"Okay. All right," said Ryoga, holding his hands in the air to show Ranma… what? That he wasn't holding a weapon? "I won't hurt you." Score on that one. "Are… are you Ranma's little boy? D-did he… with one of the girls?"

Now, Ranma could hear Akane's own voice telling him about his fiancees – as in more than two. Ryoga thought he'd gone and had a baby… wait a minute. Elder Cologne would be disappointed in his maths. He sniffled and glared through his tears. "Don't be silly, Ryoga. He'd…" The process of thinking about mathematics had stopped him crying, for some reason, so he wiped the tear tracks from under his eyes. "He'd have been nine or ten years old, and everyone knows the river gods won't give a peach to anyone that young."

Ryoga scrubbed the back of his neck. "Oh! Hahaha! Sorry, of course you're right… peaches?" he muttered to himself, but did not press Ranma to tell the story of Little Peachling, even though he had it ready on the tip of his tongue.

There was a small space of silence where Ranma looked at Ryoga a bit more carefully, through eyes clear of tears: Ryoga looked skinny, Ranma thought, and not in a good way. Wild, with slightly greasy hair all askew and bandanna smudged with dirt. His shoes were well-worn, and he was carrying a pack across his shoulders that Ranma could have curled up in.

"So, you're…" Ryoga paused, unslung the pack and perched on it, to make himself more at eye-level. Ranma felt a surge of love that knocked him sideways, because no one had shown him that kind of consideration since he'd arrived. "…so, are you really Ranma, then? You know my name."

Ranma smiled, and some of the smile must've shown his relief, because Ryoga smiled too, even if it wasn't his usual. Instead, it was a crooked, uncertain affair, as if he wasn't sure he should be smiling at Ranma.

"I… I am Saotome Ranma," Ranma said, uncertain himself. "Kind of. I want to go to the Neko Hanten. Could you tell me how to get there?"

"Uh, sure, I guess," Ryoga said. "I've been there dozens of times." Then, he paused, worrying his lower lip with a fang. "Are you sure that's where you want to go?" His features darkened. "Did the old ghoul curse you to grow younger?"

"No one's cursed me. But… maybe you might be able to help," Ranma realized, excited. "You could make a door and we could go back home!"

Then, he realized Ryoga's expression had turned blank. "…a door?" he echoed, frowning.

"You don't," Ranma said, slowly. "You don't make doors like my Ryoga."

Ranma could tell Ryoga wanted to ask him something from the way he parted his lips, but nothing came out. Finally, the older boy nodded. "All right. I'm gonna take you there, though, because if I recognized you, a lot of people might. So, uh… someone might see you and think you're grown-up Ranma… hiding or something. Which isn't what's happening. Right?"

"Right," Ranma replied. "Hiding?"

"I don't know, you're not normally a coward but stranger things have happened," Ryoga said.

Ranma laughed a little. This Ryoga was funny. A little unsure of himself. Ranma wondered if it was bad that he kind of liked it this way – liked how it put them on more even ground. More like having a big brother than –

There it was, again. The father-shaped empty space in Ranma. Ranma tried really hard not to think about it. He slipped his hand into Ryoga's automatically, because he was trying so hard not to think about it.

Ryoga startled away.

"Sorry," Ranma said.

"No. No, that's fine. You're a little kid." Ryoga said that last under his breath, as though he were reminding himself and not telling Ranma. "Sorry, I, uh, didn't have any siblings, growing up. So I'm not used to…"

"Oh." Ranma absorbed this new information. Somehow, he'd pictured Ryoga as part of a big family. For all he didn't talk much about his past, when he cared for Ranma it felt… familiar. Practiced. It was why Ranma had trusted Ryoga in the first place, in the pit. Although that memory was so dark now, Ranma almost couldn't see, feel, remember much. Just as well, he thought, and tried again for Ryoga's hand.

Ryoga allowed it, this time, and something in Ranma settled a bit at the contact. "Okay," Ryoga said. "Okay." Again, he seemed to be talking more to himself than to Ranma.

"So, how far is the Neko Hanten?" Ranma brightly inquired.

"Eh… far. A few prefectures over," Ryoga answered vaguely.

"Are you sure you know where it is?"

"Of course. Like I said, I've been there dozens of times. And," he added, in his now-trademark to-himself voice, "if I can't help out a lost kid, what kind of man am I?"

After a few hours of treking, Ranma felt himself beginning to tire. "How much further, Ryoga?" He looked up and was surprised to see Ryoga sweating.

The older boy let go of Ranma's hand and combed his hair with his fingers. "I… I think… I'm lost," Ryoga said, as if the fact had been pulled away from him with a pair of pliers.

"Okay," Ranma said. "Let's ask that man over there." He walked over to one of the farmers in the field they were striding across. "Excuse me, sir, do you know the way to the Neko Hanten?"

Ryoga's face turned bright red as the man pattered off a series of instructions.

"You got all that, kiddo?" the man said.

It was nothing, compared to the recipes, poetry, and fables Elder Cologne had Ranma memorize. "Thanks," he said, and took hold of Ryoga's arm again. He looked up with a furrowed brow when Ryoga tugged in the opposite direction. "No, Ryoga. It's this way, he said. Are you all right?"

Ryoga's face was still maroon, and growing darker. "R-Ranma, if this is just another way to torment me…"

Ranma worried his lower lip between his teeth. "I wouldn't do that, Ryoga. You know I wouldn't."

Ryoga's expression said he knew nothing of the sort.

"Is this normal? I mean, for you?"

"S-stop," Ryoga hissed. "It's too painful, you pretending you don't know."

"I don't," Ranma said. "Ryoga, please." He tugged on Ryoga's palm.

"You're just having fun at my expense again."

"I _wouldn't_," Ranma reassured him. "Come on, Ryoga. you can't leave me here. I need to see Elder Cologne. My father doesn't w-want me, and Ranma-ue…" Ranma's lips twisted at his inability to describe the _wrongness_ of Ranma-ue. "Shampoo doesn't know me and Akane-san is ten years older than me. I… you're the only one who's been... D-don't stop now, just 'cause w-we're lost…"

"Okay. Okay," Ryoga said, passing his hands in front of his eyes. "There's… a grown-up Ranma? At the Tendo Dojo?"

Ranma nodded.

"Ranma-_ue_. Bet he loves that," Ryoga grumbled. But he also subsided, and let Ranma drag him where he would.

When they finally reached the restaurant a few hours later, Ranma felt the muscles in his back relax. Now he would be with Elder Cologne, and she would… there was no word for what Ranma knew the Elder would do: _protect/guide/teach/save/discipline/help_, he felt, a-jumble. _Fix._

But when he and Ryoga came in through the door, Ranma-ue was there, waiting, seated behind one of the tables within the restaurant. A bunch of people who'd been eating at the restaurant dropped some yen at their tables and fled past Ryoga and through the open door.

"What are _you _doin' with him, P-chan?" Ranma-ue said, standing up from the table where he'd been seated. Ranma shrank back; Ranma-ue's sinuous slide to his feet looked like a tiger hunting in tall grass.

"What?" Ryoga said. "We ran into each other. He wanted to go _here_, so –"

"So you figured you'd lead him? D'you have any idea how worried sick we all were?" Ranma-ue snapped back, and Ranma realized that Ryoga being in trouble was his fault, like so much lately.

"I'm sorry I ran," he told Ranma. "I didn't mean to get Ryoga into trouble."

"Ryoga's got himself in trouble," Ranma said, without taking his eyes off of Ryoga. "I ask again, Ryoga, and this time you'd better tell me straight, or we're gonna have words. What. Were you doing. With him?"

"I was just trying to help," Ryoga stammered, backing away from Ranma-ue.

Ranma-ue snorted, tossing his head back like the horse he was named for. "Pull the other one, porkchop. You wouldn't piss on me if I was on fire."

Ryoga seemed to rally at this insult. "What do you know about me, Saotome? Not the first thing, I guess."

"I know you're a dishonorable coward who sleeps in Akane's bed," Ranma-ue returned.

Ranma could tell the argument wasn't about him running away anymore, but he wasn't sure how that had happened so fast. He could see Elder Cologne at the back of the restaurant, balancing on her staff, and could hear cheerful clinking in the kitchen that signified the presence of Shampoo… but just like at the Tendo Dojo, no grown-up interfered with the argument-in-progress.

"You'd have to be using him," Ranma-ue went on. "Could it be to get on Akane's good side? Did you think that taking him away and bringing him back could earn you some brownie points? 'Cause I don't take too well to people kidnapping my…"

Ranma had the wild urge to say, _oh. You remembered me. _But instead, he held his breath. He wanted to hear what the end of Ranma's sentence would be.

"Kidnapping?" Ryoga looked _hurt, _now. "Come on, Ranma."

"Well, you disappeared with the kid for hours. Whaddaya call that, exactly?" Ranma-ue returned, hands on his hips.

"I was looking after him just fine," Ryoga returned. "Don't make out like I'm some kind of villain."

"Well, he's coming home with me, now, so whatever you were trying, P-chan, you can keep on wishing."

Ryoga lowered his gaze to the floor and shuffled his feet. Ranma could see that the older boy's face was turning pink, as though he had been bad, and Ranma-ue had the right to chastise him.

A fierceness kindled in his heart, all of his frustrations coalescing into a ball of fire in his chest. "_He_ looked after me. He saved me from the pit, he pulled me out, he took care of me, you can't just take him away because you didn't have anyone! And I'm _never, ever_ going back with you!"

Ranma-ue turned to stare. His lips parted, as if he were going to speak, but then he darted a look at Ryoga. Finally, his own gaze trailed the floor and he turned bright red. "If I've made you feel, uh, _unwelcome_," he muttered.

Ranma suddenly felt two inches tall. "I didn't –" he said.

"May I ask," interrupted an elderly voice from the back of the restaurant, "if you are in need of assistance?"

"Sorry, Elder Cologne," Ranma said. Ranma was _very_ sorry. He darted a glance up to Ranma-ue, hoping his eyes said so. It wasn't Ranma-ue's fault he was so unhappy; not really.

"Now, little one. You say you've been looking for me. What can I do for you?" The Elder came down from her staff so that she and Ranma could see eye-to-eye.

"I can't stay at the Tendo Dojo. Can I stay here from now on?" Ranma said.

Elder Cologne stared up at the two older boys, but Ranma-ue said nothing. The Elder narrowed her eyes before returning her attention to Ranma. "You want to stay here? Why is that, child?"

"I…" Ranma couldn't help but sneak a look up at his older self to see if he looked mad. "You treat me like I'm a real person."

Elder Cologne's face did something funny, but only for an instant, before she was blank-faced again. "And the Tendos do not?" she inquired, soft.

"Hey, uh, Ranma? Maybe we should go outside," Ryoga said, thumbing the door.

"No," Ranma-ue snapped. "No way, porkchop. I… I gotta hear this. Go ahead, kid. Say it. I ain't gonna stop you."

Ranma nodded at his older self. "O-okay. E-everyone thinks I'm just a… a…" He said the word in Chinese, because he didn't know it in Japanese. It was like _potential_, but also like _fortune_ or _future_, or _path possible_. Elder Cologne had used it to describe prophetic dreams. "A-and my f-f-father doesn't w-want me. And Ryoga's s-sick 'cause of me. And so I want to stay here." Pathetically, he was on the verge of tears again, the anger that had sustained him before draining away and leaving him feeling empty and hollowed-out. He wanted to die, crying so many times in one day. It was no wonder he was such a failure, such a weak, unwomanly little girl. Unmanly… un…whichever. Bad. Wrong. Unworthy. Unwanted.

"Pops didn't mean anything by that," Ranma-ue said in a funny, cut-off voice. "He says that stuff to me all the time."

Ranma looked up in horror. "How do you _stand_ it?"

Ranma-ue shuffled a bit where he stood. "I… I mean, I'm grown-up, so I know he doesn't mean it."

"Very well," Elder Cologne said, nodding. "You may stay here."

Ranma blinked away incipient tears. "R-really?"

"On one condition," the Elder said, "which is that Ranma stay here with you."

Ranma-ue snorted. "Knew it'd be something, ya old ghoul. I'm not gonna cozy up to Shampoo." He turned to Ranma. "Listen, kiddo," he said, his features squinching with worry, "the old lady thinks that she can trick us into staying here so that Shampoo can dose me with a love potion and have me married in no time, flat." He lifted his head to stare down Elder Cologne. "Sorry, granny, no can do."

"Then I am afraid I cannot offer my domicile," the Elder said.

Ranma stared at her, horrorstruck. He recognized the Elder's Resolve Face. She seemed regretful, but determined.

"Are you serious?" Ryoga demanded. "The kid just needs a place to stay for a few days…"

"The child needs to be fostered," Elder Cologne said, and after a beat, Ranma realized she was _correcting_ Ryoga. "He will need full time minding, an education, and…" Her lips thinned. "Special Care," she finished, and even though Ranma wasn't sure what that meant, he could hear the capital letters in each word.

"I'm all right," Ranma told the Elder. "I just need a place to stay."

"The kid's fine, see?"

"Son-in-law. It is not that I do not _want_ to take the child." Elder Cologne turned her attention to Ranma himself. "But I run a restaurant, full-time. I would gladly shut down the restaurant, and take Ranma on as my responsibility," she said quickly, when it seemed Ranma-ue would interrupt, "but then I would have to return to the Juketsuzoku, because I would not have the funds to remain. If someone, such as Ranma, would stay here with me and assume childcare duties, I could perhaps make it work," she mused, "but as Ranma is unwilling, due to our… history together… I must, and _very_ regretfully, Ranma, decline."

It was a pretty speech, Ranma mused, but it was all the same to him. Elder Cologne didn't want him – _couldn't take him! _insisted his sense of fair play – so he was going back to the Tendos. It scarcely mattered why. And now he'd spoken up and Ranma-ue knew just how little he liked it there, but he'd have to _go back –_

"I'll do it," said Ryoga.

When everyone turned to face him, it seemed to Ranma that they did it in slow-motion.

"What was that, Ryoga?" Elder Cologne said. "It seems these elderly ears of mine aren't what they used to be."

"I said, I'd do it. Stay with you. And look after Ranma," Ryoga said, crossing his arms over his chest.

Ranma-ue whirled on him. "Just what are you up to?"

Ryoga looked pained. "He's just a kid, Ranma. He deserves a chance, like anybody. I know what it's like to not feel wanted."

Ranma-ue stared, blinking. He swallowed, looking away and Ranma swallowed too, in sympathy. Ranma-ue looked like he had the rice-feeling in his own throat.

"He needs help, and I can help him. What about that's so hard to understand?" Ryoga glared at Ranma-ue, by turns frustrated and imploring.

"Dunno," Ranma-ue said, after a long pause. Then, "he'd need his bedding and stuff. And clothes."

"We have all of that, here," Elder Cologne replied. Unmovable.

Her name meant mountain after all, Ranma thought, dizzied.

"I need to talk to him alone, first," Ranma-ue said. "Make sure this is really all his idea."

"Very well," Elder Cologne said, and chivvied Ryoga into the kitchen with her staff. "Let's run you and little Ranma a bath, eh, Hibiki?" she said, before she disappeared from sight. Ranma could hear her conversing with Shampoo and Ryoga in the kitchen. His blood pounding in his ears, he turned to Ranma-ue.

"You really wanna do this?" he asked.

"Yes," Ranma said. He had enough Man Amongst Men in him for that to emerge steady, strong. "I don't want to be at the Tendos'."

Ranma-ue didn't seem to know what to say anymore, but he showed no signs of leaving. Instead, he stood, shifting from foot to foot. "So, er… what's _Qián Tú_, anyhow? It sounded like it convinced the old ghoul."

Ranma nodded. "I didn't know the word in Japanese. It's like… your fortune. Your prospects, like… how well you might do. Everyone thinks you're what I'll be someday, so you're the… end. The answer to the problem. And I'm just… all the mathematical mess, before you bring the numbers together."

"I have no idea what you just said, kid."

"Oh." But then, when Ranma snuck a look up at Ranma-ue's face, he was kind of laughing, so he probably did.

"But, you said the Tendos treat you like you're just somebody's prospects for the future? Like you're… not a real person? Like Pops doesn't… doesn't really think…" Ranma-ue took in a shaky breath. "…that you're important. As you are, I mean. Just what you could be, one day?"

"You could stay here, too," he offered, clasping Ranma's palm in his own.

"What? No," Ranma-ue said, spine stiffening. "I'm fine. I don't need any help, I'm not a little kid. I'm… a Man…"

"…Amongst Men," they completed, together, Ranma looking up into the older boy's face.

"Yeah," Ranma-ue said. "That's right." He didn't look very happy about it.

Ryoga and Shampoo emerged from the kitchens together. "Hey, Ranma; you still here?" Ryoga asked, and even though there hadn't been anything in Ryoga's voice or face that was mean, Ranma-ue startled, ruffled Ranma's hair with one hand, and disappeared.

* * *

A/N: You guys are going to kill me, because this was basically sitting on my hard drive. I'd written it, then waited to see if it really felt like where the story should go - because it's quite the turn - then forgot about it. Or. To put it better, I really thought that THIS was the last chapter I'd posted here. I mean, I thought it was already up; I'm not joking. I re-read it, did some editing, and... here ya go.

I felt, when I was writing the most recent chapter of GoG, that interrupted "I'll do it" felt very familiar, and here's why! There are similarities inherent between what goes on here and in the chapter I posted (yesterday?) for GoG.

I'm really touched at the reviews I've gotten over the course of the year about this story. Don't worry, guys, I haven't forgotten Ranma... or you.

More than any other fandom (sorry HP!) Ranma fans are thoughtful, loyal, and enthusiastic. I hope I still have your support as I turn more and more of my energies to original fiction. Read my profile for additional info.

Love you guys!

-K

P.S. - Next chapter already written. Posting again in a week or less. You guys have waited long enough!

**Reviews**, please and thank you. Let me know you guys are still reading this!


	10. Arise

Ten: Arise

* * *

Ranma didn't go home right away; instead, he lit gracefully onto the roof of the Nekohanten. The old ghoul could say what she liked, but he didn't trust her not to take the opportunity to try and sway the kid into marrying Shampoo.

Someone had to look after the kid's best interests, and a soft-hearted kid like that might be pushed into agreeing to things that weren't best for him. Besides, there was already something _off_ about him, and that wasn't going to get any better if the kid was staying here with the old ghoul, Mousse, Shampoo, and Ryoga of all people. He'd only get _weirder_.

Though it had been kind of a relief to look into Ryoga's face and know for sure that there were two of him. It explained how Ryoga back home didn't seem to have a curse.

There were other differences, too, that Ranma hadn't been able to explain. When bathing Ryoga, he saw a number of scars along Ryoga's abdomen, back, and thighs. And sure, Ryoga'd always had scars – he was a high-caliber martial artist after all – but these looked deep. And purposeful. And parallel, like someone'd been trying to make a pattern of some kind. The cuts weren't as numerous as Ranma's from the Nekoken training, but they ran deeper.

There were lines around Ryoga's eyes, and the lines reminded Ranma of Doc Tofu's, before he'd left. The kind you got from smiling, lots.

And there were things in his pockets that –

Ranma stopped the thought then and there. He was the only one who'd seen anything, when he'd been undressing Ryoga and getting him into clean clothes at Kasumi's behest, and he'd pocketed the offending items right away. So long as no one else saw them, it was like they didn't exist.

So it was better that there were two. He could just think this Ryoga was crazy like little-him was crazy, and creepy, and _wrong._ And it was nothing to do with the Ryoga he knew.

"…clean clothes?" Shampoo's voice sounded from the room below.

Ranma crept around the windowsill to peer within. Inside, Shampoo was holding little-Ranma's hand; then, she lifted him up a bit to sit on the side of her Western-style bed. Little-Ranma was dampish, hair curling at the nape of his neck, and covered almost head-to-toe in what was probably one of Shampoo's towels.

Ranma half-expected Shampoo to begin waxing rhapsodic on their eventual marriage, and how someday they'd share that bed – gross, but expected from a pervert like Shampoo – but the lavender-haired girl seemed all business.

"Shampoo only have dresses for attracting too-too stubborn husband," she said, apology in her voice. "That and things to wear for fightings. Trouser of silk and such, but stitched for Shampoo."

"That's okay, Shampoo," little Ranma said, voice way more polite and language more formal than Ranma was used to using, himself.

_Weirdness number one. _No little kid should be that respectful. It was like the kid expected to be thrown out on his ear if he weren't on his best behavior, always.

"It's not like you knew I was coming," Ranma whispered, ducking his head.

The way the boy looked up from under his lashes was like baring his throat before a predator. Ranma never would have willingly appeared that vulnerable in front of Shampoo. _Weirdness number two._

Shampoo looked surprised, too. "Shampoo welcomes," she said in a more serious voice than Ranma had heard from _her _in some time. "Sister from tribe."

Little Ranma looked up. "If we wait another minute or two, the water'll be cold and we _can_ be sisters."

_Weirdness number three. _Willingness to be in the girl body without at least a real good reason.

"Here, we do quick," Shampoo said, and took a cup of water off of her dresser. Where she might have splashed it in grown-Ranma's face, she gently poured it over the head of little-Ranma.

Ranma watched as his younger self transformed, going from wide grey eyes to bright, snapping blue – going from dark, almost pitch-black hair to a pale, coppery gold.

Weirdness number four, having the curse so young… although Ranma had got it himself when he was a little younger than he liked to let on. If he'd been a _real_ girl, he'd have gotten red beans and rice a year after the curse had struck. But usually he talked like it was a recent thing, even if he'd been a teenaged girl almost as long as he'd been a teenaged boy. It made it sound a little less weird if he kept implying he hadn't been like this for long. He wasn't sure why, or why seeing little-girl-him felt so much stranger than _being _teen-girl him.

Little Ranma seemed perfectly comfortable slipping one of Shampoo's silk dresses on; it hit her just below the knee, where on Shampoo it barely covered her most secret parts.

"To sleep in," Shampoo said. "Tomorrow, we get other things." She turned in the doorway. "Ranma is ever-so-welcome, but he need not worry about thanks," and closed the door.

Ranma thought he should leave. Obviously, if Shampoo and the Old Ghoul's intentions weren't honorable, they were playing a long game, and it looked like the little girl inside was preparing for bed.

Ranma shook himself. The kid inside could have red hair and happily wear one of Shampoo's iinazuke-bait dresses as pyjamas, but that didn't make him any less a little boy. It just made him a really unusual, really confused little boy.

Maybe it was curiosity that made Ranma stay. Maybe something sat uneasy in his gut at the idea of leaving a child, any child, with the schemers at the Nekohanten. Maybe Ranma disliked the idea of going back to the noisy Tendo household, where he knew he would be blamed for not returning little-Ranma to his proper place. Perhaps it was for all these reasons that Ranma scrambled along the shingles for better purchase and curled up into a small ball to doze.

Ranma was awoken by the shouts of a child. _Where am I? Why am I so cold? What's that terrible noise?_ It took Ranma about as long as usual to wake up.

When Ranma finally remembered himself and where he was, his heart started thumping wildly in his chest. The child! He was in danger. _I knew it, I knew it!_ Ranma thought, suffused with a sick-making mixture of triumph and terror. He scrambled down the roof and leapt soundlessly through the window.

The door to Shampoo's bedroom opened, and Ranma dropped to the floor behind the bed, hiding himself from view.

"Ranma!" Ryoga's voice called, and Ranma almost addressed him, almost stood up. Then wasn't quite sure why he didn't, why he kept himself silent and hidden.

"Ranma, Ranma," the Lost Boy said, reaching out and shaking the little girl's form. "You're having a nightmare!"

Ranma crept backward, oozing towards the window, blending with the shadows. From his new perspective, he could see:

Ryoga. Ryoga was sitting at his bedside – at _little-Ranma's_ bedside – placing one large, warm hand on the redhead's shoulder and shaking her, but gently. In the dim light of the moon and the stars, Ranma could see that Ryoga's features were pinched with worry.

Little-Ranma awoke with a gasp and flung herself into Ryoga's arms. "Ryoga! Ryoga!" she exclaimed, over and over, sobbing fit to break.

"Oh, kami. Okay, okay," Ryoga said, patting her back in a way that even Ranma could see was awkward and stilted. He drew back, after a moment. "What was it?" he said. "D'you wanna talk about it?"

The redhead blinked away tears. "C-cats," she whispered, and dropped her head in her hands. Ranma could see from his vantage point that she was still trembling, and every now and again, her whole body would shudder violently, as though she'd been drenched in icy water.

"O-okay, cats," Ryoga replied. "I, uh… Ranma, Elder Cologne told me about the other Ryoga. You… you gotta know I'm not him."

_You idiot, _Ranma thought, _that's not what she needs to hear right now_. Then, he wondered what had gotten into him. What he was thinking. What he was doing lying on the floor perfectly still hoping that both people in the room were so wrapped up in one another, in their own fears, that darkness, complete silence, and a hint of Umi-Sen-Ken would keep him hidden.

"I know," Little-Ranma said with a hint of reproach to her voice, so she must've been thinking what Ranma was thinking.

Of _course_ she was.

"I just mean, I… I'm no good at this. What do I do?"

The redhead laughed. "Silly," she said. "You hold me. You tell me it's all right. You say it's j-just a d-dream."

Ryoga opened his arms gamely, and the redhead fell into him, wrapping her smaller arms around his frame and squeezing. This time, with practice, it seemed more natural. Ryoga's arms came up to cradle her, and she sighed, burrowing her head into his shoulder.

Ranma, hiding in the shadows, took in a shaky breath. His heart began to beat faster. Sweat beaded on his brow. He recognized the signs of panic, but didn't know why he felt as trapped, as hemmed-in as he did. Then he realized he could feel – no, _feel_ wasn't the right word – sense, _sense-memory_, the embrace, it _looked familiar_, it felt _familiar_, he could _remember feeling it._

"It's all right," Ryoga said, bringing his hand up to the back of the redhead's coppery hair and twining his fingers through it. "It's just a dream."

Ranma held back a gasp as his eyes followed Ryoga's fingers, they way they didn't just stroke, but untangled the little girl's locks, painlessly sorting and ordering the snarls. A flash: he was lying beside a river, his feet dangling in the current, his red-gold hair lying out behind him atop the sandy soil, drying in the sun. He kicked small, white limbs back and forth in the water. The air was warm, drying the beads of moisture that sat against his legs and arms. A large square of fabric was thrown across the redhead's form to preserve modesty as he dried off. Ryoga was beside him; he could smell his smell along with the scent of clover and the metallic scent of fresh water, and hear him humming as he fished. One of his hands was tangled in Ranma's hair, carding through, sorting and putting it back into order…

Ranma gave a hoarse cry and stumbled back, not caring, now, if anyone heard or saw him, only knowing he had to get away. He careened into the windowframe, leapt up for the roof and ran as fast as his legs would carry him, back to the Tendo Dojo.

When he found his bedroll, his and his father's room was empty; _Pops must be off carousing again_, he thought sourly. He cleaned his teeth quickly, splashed his face with warm water and climbed into bed.

His face was wet, and for one, mad moment, he thought, _the river_, but that was nuts, _'cause that was years ago_. Then, _no, that's nuts 'cause that never happened at all. _And then he realized that only his cheeks were wet. _That's it,_ he thought. _Kodachi's poisoned me one time too many. Or the stress, yeah. People hallucinate because of stress, they hear things, they see things. I'm going crazy._

This line of thought wasn't helping him feel better. He laughed into his pillow and clutched it close, and suddenly he was sobbing, helplessly, brokenly, and it was completely _nuts_, he'd _lost it_, because he wasn't even sure what he was so sorry over, he only knew his chest was on fire and his lungs ached and something that had been building in him for a long, long time felt as though it were finally breaking free. But it felt terrible, too, because he _didn't know why he was upset_, losing the kid was terrible but it wasn't like something that bad didn't happen twice a week to Saotome Ranma, and it was no big deal, it was _all_ no big deal, he hadn't cried like this since…

_Get ahold of yourself_, he ordered, _for Kami-sama's sake, Saotome Ranma, you're not a child, you're not a little girl, you're a Man Amongst Men, you are to be respected and feared and admired, and there isn't much of anything to be respected in your behavior just now. Pull yourself together!_

So Ranma did, although he still felt bewildered, and a little scared of himself. Luckily, he didn't feel that way for long before he dropped into sleep like a stone.

* * *

When Ranma woke the next morning, his father was in panda form and still asleep. For once, Ranma felt no urge at all to wake him, with a splash of water or otherwise. Instead, he crept out into the kitchen, where Kasumi was making tea, clad in slippers and a housecoat.

"Hey, Kasumi," Ranma greeted her. "Any of that left for me?"

Kasumi nodded and gestured towards the teapot still warm on the stove. She did not get up to serve him; he and Kasumi had an understanding about the early morning.

"I didn't see little Ranma in his bedroll," Kasumi said.

"No," Ranma said. "He's with the old ghoul, and Ryoga."

"And Ryoga?" Kasumi's gaze traveled in the direction of the stairs.

Ranma shook his head. "Other one," he said, safe in the knowledge that very little could perturb Kasumi.

"I see." For a few moments, they did nothing but sip tea. Ranma still felt hollowed-out, and a little frightened of his own behavior. If he could break down like that and not even know why, what was to say he wouldn't do that in front of Kuno during their next fight, or during class? What was to say he wouldn't do it right now?

"Pops said he was a worthless ol' copy of me, and next I'd be saying my girl-type was real, if I acted like he was a person," he said, even though Kasumi had not asked for additional clarification.

"Saotome-san is not always very tactful," Kasumi replied, following her statement with a long, warming sip of tea. For Kasumi, this was like cursing someone up one side and down the other.

"So he left with the old mummy. I guess she was good to him back in China."

"What about Ryoga?"

"Ryoga was… well, you heard the kid when he was here," Ranma said. "Ryoga looked after the kid, I guess. So when the kid ran into the Ryoga _we_ know… he just latched right back on. Like a limpet."

"Ranma, that's unkind."

"I guess." Ranma finished his tea and set the cup in the sink. A crack ran up the porcelain, and the cup split cleanly in half. He stared at it for a moment. "Sorry, Kasumi, I think I broke it," he said.

"I've got lots of cups," Kasumi replied.

"Okay," Ranma said. He stared at the cup. He must've hit its breaking point with the edge of the sink for it to have split along one line like that.

"Ranma," Kasumi said. While Ranma'd been staring at the cup, she'd risen from her seat and approached him. He startled.

"Wow, Kasumi, you can be quiet when you want to," he said.

"Ranma," she repeated, "is there anything you want to talk about?"

"No. What would I want to talk about?" Ranma said, looking at Kasumi. Kasumi was tall; they were almost the same height. He was looking almost directly into plum-dark eyes.

"I'm not certain," Kasumi said. "Only, it seems that you've been off-balance ever since little-Ranma arrived." Kasumi poured herself a second cup.

"He doesn't think the girl-curse is weird," Ranma blurted.

Kasumi moved back to the table and seated herself. "Well, no," she agreed.

"_That's _weird," Ranma told her, turning to face her. "That he's okay with it."

Kasumi looked up at him. "He's a little boy, Ranma. He's gotten used to it younger. And I'm not sure if his father's told him about the Man Amongst Men contract."

Ranma shook his head. "No, I've heard him muttering about it. It worries him, being a Man Amongst Men. But he doesn't seem to think being a girl has anything to do with that."

"Maybe it doesn't."

"Of course it does," Ranma snapped, then took in a deep breath. "Sorry, yeah. Being a good man and being a Manly Man like mom wants ain't the same thing. I know I'm just a kid to you, Kasumi, but even I know that."

"You're not 'just a kid' to me, Ranma. You're my kid brother," Kasumi said warmly.

It wasn't the first time she'd said so, but Ranma could count the times on one hand. It still made him blush. He wondered if he'd ever get used to it, being Kasumi's – anything.

"Thanks," he said, and his voice was rough.

"Ranma," Kasumi said, then paused, running a fingertip around the edge of her teacup, thinking. "Everybody has to decide, as they grow up, who they want to be," she said. "Unless there's something in your heart that guides you in the same direction as what Daddy and Saotome-san, and your mother, and Akane, and even Ryoga want you to be, who are you, really? Not Saotome Ranma – just a collection of the stitched-together pieces of other people's expectations. That doesn't sound like a very _happy_ or healthy person to me."

"But what about my honor?" Ranma said. "The Saotome honor?"

"I can see how you might feel the honor of your family rests solely on your own shoulders," Kasumi said, smiling wryly. "For that reason especially, you must discover the nature of your own honor; because if you have no self-respect, how can you respect others? All other esteem must come crashing down without that first, and most fundamental foundation."

"You're going to start singing _the greatest love of all_," Ranma deadpanned.

"If it would help," Kasumi replied. "And has it occurred to you, in all this, that little-Ranma _is_ your family?"

Ranma licked his lips. "It's not like that."

"It's just like that," Kasumi countered. "He is family, Ranma, and that _is_ sacred. You owe it to him, the way we owe it to all of our little brothers and little sisters, and the children who come later, to ease the path. To make their lives better than ours were, while still maintaining our family honor as best we're able."

Ranma took in a shaky breath. "I… he's better off where he is."

Kasumi eyed him. "You're not just saying so, Ranma?"

"No. No, he's way better off with the old ghoul than with…" He closed his eyes tightly. "Pops. Or… me."

An expression passed over Kasumi's face too fast for Ranma to follow what it meant: her eyes squeezed shut for a moment, her lips seemed to disappear. But it was only for a moment.

"Well. If you're sure," she said.

"Yeah," Ranma said, and felt a little bit better.

* * *

Ranma ignored his father at breakfast that morning, and did his best to put off Nabiki's and Akane's questions about the kid.

"I found him. He's safe, but he ain't staying with us," he said. They'd have to be satisfied with that. Of course, nobody was; that was just Ranma's luck.

"What do you mean?" Akane asked, putting her chopsticks down by her plate. "Where's he staying, then?"

Nabiki's brows lifted. "Geez, Saotome, you don't just hand a kid off to the first responsible-looking gentleman and lady who pass by."

"I didn't," Ranma snapped. He wasn't sure if he was still feeling… uh, upset… or just _worried_ he still was, but whatever the reason he felt antsy enough that he nearly _itched_ with it. "He's with the old ghoul. 'Cause Pops called him imaginary, and 'cause he's the mess of numbers before the problem is solved. Or something." He dove into his breakfast with gusto, ignoring the silence around the table and hoping it didn't mean he was about to be blamed for the whole fiasco.

"Maybe if we had made more of an effort," Kasumi said.

Ranma was grateful for the 'we', at least.

"What for?" Genma said. "He'll be gone soon anyhow. What's the use in getting attached? That's all I meant."

"That was no reason to say something hurtful," Akane said with a frown. "I have half a mind to go over to Shampoo's and apologize for all of us. What must they think of us?"

"Don't," Ranma said. Something in his stomach roiled at the idea. "Just leave it, Akane, okay?"

"I'm only trying to help, Ranma," Akane said. "I don't know what we did wrong, but we drove away a little boy who needed our help! Doesn't that make you feel bad?"

"Just stay out of it, tomboy! It isn't your business!"

Akane turned white, then devoted her attention wholly to the food in front of her. "Look," she said into her rice, "I guess it's not my _business_, seeing as we have _nothing to do with one another…_"

"C'mon, Akane, don't be like that," Ranma groaned. No matter what he said, it was always wrong.

"…but _I_ feel ashamed, all right? I'm going to go over there whether you like it or not."

"Fine," Ranma said, standing from the table. "Just don't expect him to go back with you. He likes Shampoo way better than you, so don't interfere."

Akane turned red this time. She turned to Ranma, lips parted, and Ranma just knew she was going to let him have it.

But she saw something on his face, and stopped. She blinked a few times. "Sure thing, Ranma," she said, peaceably. "No interfering. I just want to make sure he's okay. Isn't that all right?"

Nabiki turned to stare.

Ranma nodded, slowly. "Uh. Yeah, Akane. No problem."

She offered him a small smile. "Good." Akane nodded, though more to herself than to Ranma, then Ranma saw her throat bob as she swallowed. "It's just important to me to know he's doing well," she said, but earnestly, and looked up to stare into Ranma's eyes.

"Y-yeah," Ranma stammered, averting his. "Thanks, Akane." _You're a good friend,_ he thought, but couldn't make himself say. _No matter how we argue, you know what I need better than I do sometimes_.

For once, the pair seemed to understand one another perfectly. Akane went back to her meal, ignoring Tendo-san weeping about _joining the houses_ and Nabiki asking if Kasumi'd put something 'special' in the tea, and nobody brought up the kid again.

But over the next few days, Ranma checked on the kid a bunch: before school, before anyone else was awake, he leaned upside down and peered through the window to see the kid – red or black hair sticking up from underneath the covers, as often one as the other – sleeping peacefully. At lunch, he often saw the kid eating or sometimes doing what looked like some kind of writing or figuring with numbers. After school, he'd see the kid, now outfitted in a much smaller version of Shampoo's three-quarter-length satin trousers and short-sleeved top, playing outside the Nekohanten.

He never let the kid see him, though. It was better to make a clean break.

* * *

Ranma was rifling through Akane's comics one evening, looking for her latest DBZ when he felt the pressure of eyes on him. He turned to the bed to find Ryoga's eyes open, looking around the room; he didn't yet seem aware of Ranma.

Ranma approached Akane's bedside so that he entered Ryoga's field of vision.

_Ranma_, Ryoga mouthed, but no sound came out.

"Hey, buddy," Ranma said, surprised to hear how quiet his own voice sounded, like the poison might've made Ryoga's ears hurt or his head ache. "Wow, you're awake." _Brilliant, Saotome_, he thought. _Next, tell him the sky is blue_.

_Ranma_, Ryoga tried again, and this time, there was a slight wheeze behind it.

"Hold up, I'm gonna get you some water," Ranma said, and ran to the bathroom, heart thumping in his chest for no reason he could name. He returned so quickly that a little bit of water slopped along the side of the cup. "Here ya go," Ranma said, and when it became clear that Ryoga still couldn't sit up, he perched on the side of the bed and tilted some water into Ryoga's mouth, watching Ryoga's throat work as he swallowed.

"Ranma," Ryoga croaked.

"Yeah, I'm here," Ranma said, unexpectedly touched. Then, when Ryoga shook his head from side to side, he felt realization dawn. "The boy," Ranma said, feeling like an idiot. "You wanna know where the kid is."

"He came?" Ryoga said in a small voice, and Ranma realized that Ryoga hadn't even been sure that the kid was _in this universe_ with him. Wow.

"Yeah, yeah, I saw him. Big shock," Ranma babbled, "lookin' at my own face…"

"Safe?" Ryoga said.

"Safe, yeah, he's safe," Ranma replied, doubly glad of his insistence on checking on the kid every day. It made him sound and be _sure_. "He's with the old ghoul."

Ryoga smiled, showing a hint of fang, and his eyes drooped. "Thank you, Ranma," he said, gripping one of Ranma's hands in both of his and squeezing.

Then, he dropped right back off. But Ranma could tell, from his even breathing and the way his lashes fluttered, that Ryoga was really asleep, now, that he'd awaken again soon.

Ranma placed the cup of water on Akane's bedside table, then pulled the table a little closer so it'd be easier to reach. Then, he leapt to Akane's windowsill, and prepared to launch off, towards the Nekohanten; but he paused.

It was like he wasn't sure he could really believe it, what had just happened. It was like he had to test it, to be sure. He climbed down from the window far more carefully than he'd leapt there, and approached Akane's bed again.

Ryoga's breathing was deep, regular and even. His skin, which had been clammy-pale except where it was touched with fever, seemed rosy and healthy again. His lashes fluttered against his cheeks.

"_Ryoga_," Ranma whispered, under his breath.

"Mmmph?" Ryoga said, turning his head towards the sound of Ranma's voice, but obviously still very asleep.

Ranma pressed one hand to his mouth. How weird, that Ryoga should turn _towards_ his voice. He'd have thought that the Lost Boy was at least smart enough to expect an attack. "_It's nothing_," he whispered. "_Go back to sleep._"

"Mmmg," Ryoga replied, and his head flopped back to a more comfortable position.

Ranma stood there a little while longer. "Okay, be right back," he whispered, but very soft; this time, Ryoga didn't react at all. He climbed back up onto the sill, forced himself not to turn back around again.

Ryoga was all right, now, and going off to find the old ghoul and the kid wouldn't change that. He was going to be just fine.

Ranma leapt off into the night.

* * *

Little Ranma was already changed for bed when Ranma arrived at the Nekohanten; she wore pyjamas with feet, emblazoned with flying pigs.

"Hey," Ranma greeted little-him. He couldn't stop grinning, and after a moment, he found the expression reflected on the face of his younger self.

"Is… is it Ryoga?" the redhead whispered, with such reverence that Ranma felt a little uncomfortable, but only for a moment.

Ranma could see Ryoga – the younger Ryoga, that was – emerging from the kitchens with a dishtowel over his arm. "Yeah, it sure is," Ranma said. "He woke up a few minutes ago."

Little Ranma squealed with joy and ran at Ranma. It was all he could do to catch and contain the squirming child. "Whoa, whoa, kiddo, okay," he said.

"Can we go see him?" the redhead enthused, turning in Ranma's arms to face Ryoga. "Can we go see him _now_?"

"Let me just tell, uh, Elder Cologne," Ryoga said, obviously still unsure about using the child's title for the Amazon. He disappeared into the shop, at least, but Ranma saw him checking the potato bin and the refridgerator for the Elder.

"Um, I'd better find Elder Cologne," the redhead said apologetically, worming her way to the floor and pelting off into the Nekohanten.

"Hey, Shampoo," Ranma said.

Shampoo flipped through the air to land in front of Ranma. "No fair; how airen know Shampoo on roof?"

"Experience," Ranma said. "I can tell when I'm being watched."

"Airen no fun," Shampoo said.

"You've just got to get sneakier," Ranma said, then immediately regretted it. _Me and my big mouth_.

Shampoo waited with Ranma in surprisingly companionable silence. Then, "Ranma say she and Shampoo best of friends in village," she said.

"Oh, come on," Ranma returned, rolling his eyes. "You'd say anything."

"So hard to believe?" Shampoo shot back.

Ranma realized she maybe sounded a little hurt. "Maybe if you weren't tryin' ta marry me all the time," he allowed.

"Rúguǒ zhǐyǒu wǒde zhàngfu huì réngrán zhàn lì. Ránhòu jiàng wú xū zhuī zhe tā," Shampoo muttered.

Shampoo was speaking in Chinese, which had always sounded like someone singing through their nose, to Ranma. Only now, each of the sounds was bending, twisting into something familiar, like a nursery tune folded into Bach or Mendelsson, until it _almost_ sounded like he should know it, understand what it meant. Something about _running_ versus staying still; he was almost sure.

Or maybe he was just imagining that he could understand it. Maybe if he asked Shampoo right now what she'd said, she'd prove him wrong, and he would be allowed to believe he was having an ordinary, run-of-the-mill sort of nervous breakdown. Not that he and the kid were… bleeding together, like ink pressed into water, like two funhouse-mirror reflections resolving into one, real person. He shivered. His lips parted to ask.

Then, for better or worse, the kid bounded out, still in feetie-pyjamas, Ryoga and the old ghoul at her heels.

_Her heels_, Ranma thought, shaking his head. Suddenly, he had sympathy for all those people who couldn't think of him as anything but a girl in his guise as Ranma-onna; it was really hard to look at that redheaded ponytail and big blue eyes and think anything but _girl_, and everything that went along with _girl_.

"You ain't coming, are you, porkchop?" Ranma prompted.

Ryoga shrugged. "It isn't every day someone gets to meet some kind of copy of themselves." He snorted. "Unless they're you, Ranma, and then it's a biannual event."

"Ha ha," Ranma said.

"Shall we go, son-in-law? Granddaughter?"

"Yeah, I guess," Ranma said, and the strange procession took off through the night.

It was weird, Ranma thought, looking around himself at his company. The kid was practically swinging on Ryoga's arm, and he figured she… _she_, he guessed, _sort of_, _kind of_… he figured she must think of this as some kind of crazy sleepover party.

She looked up at him through manic eyes. "It's waaay past my bedtime," she said, delighted with herself.

Ranma figured he should stop being weirded out when their minds were headed along the same routes. Any day, now. "Yeah, huh? When would that be?" he said, just to say something. He already knew, from checking on her every night, of course.

She made a face. "Nine," she said. "Nine on the dot."

Elder Cologne, pogoing beside her, gave a wise nod. "But today is special," she allowed.

"Because Ryoga's awake!" little Ranma exclaimed.

"We don't know your Ryoga's state of health," Cologne told the child. "You're going to have to be careful around him until we are sure he is well."

"May be too-too weak," Shampoo agreed. "Poison may not have left body complete. Entire." She hissed, frustrated. "All the way."

Little Ranma looked up at her and nodded, full of grown-up solemnity.

"And you, porkchop?" Ranma prompted. "I mean, the old ghoul's coming to make sure this guy's okay, right, and it's obvious why the kid wanted to tag along. Are you here to show Akane what a good little piggy you've been, helping to take care of the kid?"

Ryoga looked over his shoulder at Ranma, irritation marring his brow. "How should I know what he'll tell me, Ranma? Except the story of how he adopted Ranma, I guess."

"He didn't _adopt_ me," Ranma snapped. "Her. _Him_. Geez," he said, bringing a hand to his forehead. "This is gonna get confusing."

"I'll call you Ranma A, and her Ranma B," Ryoga quipped, swinging little Ranma through the air.

"That sounds really stupid," Ranma said. "Besides –" Then, he swallowed. He hadn't believed it, but maybe little Ranma was right, because he'd been about to protest that he was the _real_ one. The _right_ one. He was glad he'd swallowed the words before they'd popped out.

But little Ranma seemed to know, anyway. "I'm Ranma, too," she said.

Ryoga looked down at her. "Of course you are," he said, but Ranma got the feeling that Ryoga didn't think the tiny redhead was quite as _real_ as the Ranma he knew, either.

Shampoo glared at the boys and scooped Ranma up to her hip. "Tell Shampoo more about first time Shampoo meet Ranma."

The redhead smiled and began to chatter at a lower volume, her hands moving expressively as she talked.

Ranma frowned. Maybe it would help if he just thought of the kid as not being him at all – just a child who needed his help. Maybe that would make it all easier to understand. Easier to bear.

"Here we are," Cologne said, and Ranma realized that somehow they'd already reached the Tendo Dojo. He felt like he supposed Ryoga must feel all the time: like the streets stretched and contracted while he wasn't looking, that somehow they'd reached his door without traversing much of the space in between.

"What if he's gone back to sleep again?" little Ranma whispered into the hush left by the grown-ups. "What if we go up to 'kane's room and he's lying there and we can't wake him up no matter how hard we try?"

"Easy, kid," Ranma replied, remembering how he had to check on Ryoga again before he could countenance leaving. "Besides," he added, "there's only one way to find out. Now, are you a Man Amongst Men?" Ranma knew what his pops trying to get the kid to be a man had amounted to: a lot of nightmares about cats and needing to be rescued by a stranger, and right away he wished he could take it back.

But the kid slipped out of Shampoo's hands and made her way over to him. "Yes," she said, lifting her hand to clasp his. "But only if we go together."

Ranma swallowed at the feel of the small hand squeezing his own. Somehow, the kid knew how weird this all made him feel and was trying to help out. "I already feel braver," she said, looking up at him, her jaw firming. Letting him save face.

Ranma felt something warm and liquid turn in his chest. He took in a quick, uneven breath through his mouth, nodded, and together they led the way into the house.

The procession kept itself quiet in deference to the other members of the household, who Ranma inferred were asleep, or at least in their rooms for the night; he thought he could hear Nabiki clacking away at her keyboard, the hiss and creak of her computer chair as she shifted position. The martial artists moved without trouble past Akane, asleep on the couch, and up the stairs. Ranma felt the hand inside his tighten, and he looked down at the redhead; but she wasn't looking at him. Her intensely blue eyes were gazing straight forward-and-through, as though she didn't even see the house all around her, but a nightmare of what she might find in Akane's room: Ryoga unconscious, same as before; Ryoga seizing again; Ryoga, dead.

He wanted to stop and comfort her, but he felt – with a certainty that surprised him and shouldn't have – that if they stopped now she wouldn't be able to proceed under her own power, and that would shame her. Him. He remembered that childish helplessness as his own, felt its frustration like a physical weight pressing him into an acceptable child-shape of expectations and abilities, the way everyone, even his father, hadn't expected he was capable of much, but was always _disappointed_ when he couldn't quite measure up, couldn't do for himself… the way that this made him need to do better, to be better…

Ranma felt a tug on his own hand and realized he'd been lost, for a moment. He looked down into his own eyes and felt a dizzying instant of vertigo. He wanted to let go of the kid – hell. He wanted to disavow her, never look her in the face again, only he wasn't a coward. He compensated by clinging – letting her lead him up each stair, pulling him forward, sometimes, by leaning backwards with all her strength.

Ranma felt lucky it was dark, that his younger counterpart was the only one close enough to see his face. He dreaded what the others might read there. It was the kid, the kid's fault he was feeling so off-kilter, that had to be it – these emotions weren't his at all, they were hers… The urge to shove her away spiked in one, terror-filled moment, but Ranma mastered himself: it wasn't the kid's fault, it _wasn't_… he didn't know why he kept wanting to blame her for everything that made him feel _off_, but the fact remained.

He didn't even know why he was so afraid.

He reached his hand out to Akane's door and turned the knob. His younger self dashed through the entryway, then stopped, as though she had come up against some invisible barrier that extended two feet from Akane's bed. Ryoga's breathing was still even, Ranma was relieved to note, and his color seemed even higher than before. Tension bled from Ranma, and he swept the little girl up in his arms in his relief. "See?" he said. "What did I tell you? Look at how much better he is."

The redhead laced her arms around his neck. She looked up into his eyes; then, she turned to Elder Cologne, wordless.

"He certainly seems better, child," she pronounced. The Amazon descended from her staff to use it to poke seemingly random points on Ryoga's form that Ranma supposed were pressure points.

"Whoa," the second Ryoga said, coming up from behind Ranma. His grey-green eyes were huge in his face, his lips parted. "That's… whoa."

"Yeah," Ranma said, quietly, for once in no mood to taunt the Lost Boy about his inability to articulate what he saw. He barely could put the weirdness to words, himself.

The old ghoul poked and prodded gently at the sleeping figure for another moment before shaking him awake. "Ryoga," she said. "Ryoga, boy, wake up."

Ryoga mumbled in his sleep, but his lashes fluttered and in a few moments, he woke naturally, and sat up.

The redhead gave a gasp, slid down away from Ranma and flew to Ryoga with a cry.

"Whoa," Ryoga said, catching her up in his arms. "Hey, Ranma, it's okay. It's – what happened? You and Shampoo weren't fighting again, were you?" he asked.

Ranma could tell by the quality of the other boy's voice that Ryoga wasn't fully awake, yet. Nobody said a word, waiting for Ryoga to come to his own conclusions, but Ranma could feel Shampoo at his side, shifting from foot-to-foot.

"Where…?" Ryoga muttered. Then, in a move nearly too fast to see, he shifted the small girl behind him and assumed a tight, defensive stance.

Ranma opened his mouth to say, _nice greeting to the folks who saved your bacon, P-chan_, but the man beat him to the punch.

Ryoga's eyes narrowed. "How'd I get here?"

The redhead was wrapped her arms around the back of Ryoga's left shoulder like a tiny monkey and began whispering furiously in his ear, but she was way too far off for Ranma to make anything out.

"I carried you, P-chan," Ranma said. "No need to thank me, just in case the thought crossed your mind."

Ryoga met Ranma's eyes and something in him seemed to harden. "Do you know the _Umi Sen-Ken_?" he said.

"Hey, Captain Random, I know you've been unconscious, but that's no excuse," Ranma replied, then ran a hand through his fringe when Ryoga's expression didn't shift one jot. "Fine, yes. I do. Not that I'd use it. And the _Hiryuu Shouten Ha_ and the _Kachuu Tenshin Amaguriken _are among my other techniques, in case you were wondering."

Ryoga blinked, wide-eyed, for another few seconds, and then the tension bled out of his frame, pouring off his muscles, leaving him trembling. Ranma took a hesitant step forward, then another when the older Hibiki showed no signs of startling.

"I'm in Akane's room?" Hibiki said. "Okay. Okay, Ranma," he added, and it took Ranma a moment to realize that he was beginning to reply to whatever the redhead was whispering in his ear. "Come here, no, it's all right; I'm all right," he said, gathering the girl into his lap, where she began to tremble and cry. "I've frightened you; I'm so, so sorry," he said, but then looked right up into Ranma's eyes.

Ranma swallowed, and crouched lower so that Hibiki was in a more dominant position. "Yo, Ryoga," he said, "you okay?"

Hibiki smiled tiredly. "Yes, Ranma," he said. "Boy, are you a sight for sore eyes. Thought I'd dreamed it." He brought a hand up and used it to cup the back of the redhead's hair. "There, sweetheart," he said. "I'm all right. We're both all right."

She just clutched: no response at all. It was painful to watch.

Ryoga looked up towards the rest of the room for the first time. "Elder," he said. "You helped look after Ranma; thank you." It was not a question. He turned his gaze towards Shampoo, smiling in a way that Ranma didn't recognize. "Hello, Shampoo," he said. "I'm glad to see you."

Shampoo looked startled. "H-hello," she stammered, then flushed prettily.

Ryoga's gaze finally landed on his younger counterpart. "Hi," he said, warmly. "Hibiki Ryoga." He held his hand out, palm up.

Ranma wasn't sure if he was calling the other boy, or introducing himself.

The younger boy stood motionless for a moment nearly long enough to be rude, then slowly approached the bed to take his counterpart's hand. When their skin made contact, he shuddered.

"You must be very confused," Ryoga told him. "Come, I'll answer any questions you have. You too, Ranma," he said.

Ryoga was still tugging his younger counterpart towards the bed, gently, inexorably. He shifted the redhead to sit sideways on his lap so that her head rested on his shoulder and her legs curled together over his hip, and shimmied until he was pressed against the headboard. Then, he dragged the younger Ryoga until he stood by the bed.

This close, the differences were so obvious that Ranma thought he was crazy for not noticing them right away. There was a soft boyishness to the younger Ryoga's features, and a sharp, chiseled cast to the man's. Ranma never would have thought of his sometime-friend, sometime-enemy as _soft_ or _boyish_, but sitting next to his older self, it was clear that both applied. Even when the older Ryoga's features softened as he clucked to the tiny girl curled in his lap, it could not be clearer that he was a _man_, rather than a boy.

"Come on, Ryoga," said Hibiki. "Sit, before you tip over."

The Ryoga that Ranma knew – the one he'd gone to school with, the one who he'd fought with, the one who'd tracked him around the globe – had gone white, and something in his face _crumpled_. Ranma couldn't escape the suspicion he was watching something so private he should avert his eyes, and he wasn't alone.

"Come, great-granddaughter," Elder Cologne said, in the gentlest voice Ranma had ever heard her use. "We're intruding on a family matter."

Ranma expected Shampoo to balk, but she didn't. "Ranma," she said, and both Ranmas looked up.

"Little Ranma," she laughed. "Mèimei. Will see later, yes?"

"B-bye, Shampoo," Ranma sniffled.

"Yes, yes," Shampoo said. "Everything _all right_ now, yes? All better."

The redhead looked like death, if death wore piggie pyjamas. She didn't agree, which surprised Ranma. He noticed that the grown-up Ryoga was observing her just as carefully.

"Goodnight, child," Elder Cologne said. "If you feel uncomfortable – _at all_ – you ask my Ryoga to take you right back to your room with me." Her gaze took Ryoga in as well, then nodded, as though something she saw both satisfied her, and confirmed some older suspicion.

"I will. Goodnight, Elder Cologne," the girl said, and wrapped her arms around Ryoga's chest again as the Amazons leapt out the window and disappeared into the night.

Ranma watched as the older Ryoga tugged one, last time, and then there were two Ryogas sitting side-by-side, watching each other, one with unmistakable tenderness, the other with an expression Ranma couldn't interpret; the closest he could come was _fear_, which he had rarely ever seen on his rival's face.

The redhead poked her head up with a bit of suspicion in her gaze. He guessed she didn't understand what was going on any better than Ranma did, himself, but her eyes sought him out. She turned to Ryoga, wiping her cheeks impatiently. "Ranma checked on me every day," she said.

Ranma gaped. "Hey!"

"I'm you," little Ranma told him, blue eyes wide. "I know where you like to hide. And how."

Ryoga looked up. "Thank you, Ranma." He smiled; crinkles formed at the corner of his eyes. "And for saving my life, too."

Ranma perched on the end of the bed. "No problem…" He didn't know what to call this new version of Ryoga. Pig-boy and porkchop and P-chan seemed wildly inappropriate, all of a sudden. "Uh, Hibiki?"

"Hibiki is fine," Ryoga said. "It's better than some of the names I've gotten saddled with."

"You've been a lot of places?" Ryoga asked, voice shaky.

Ranma examined him. The younger boy still looked genuinely _upset_: in his body language Ranma read the need for flight. The older Ryoga's right hand went to the back of his counterpart's neck and squeezed, gently.

"Yes," he replied. "Dozens of worlds," he said. "Maybe more; I lose track."

"You," said Ryoga, shoulders twitching at the touch, like a spooked horse; but he stopped short of shaking the hand away. "You wanted to know about Ranma's martial arts because it's… his history. Know which techniques he has, you know his story?"

Hibiki nodded. "And allies."

Ranma scoffed. "So you're saying, what? The _Kachuu Tenshin Amaguriken_ means I can get along with the old ghoul?"

"Or Shampoo, she knows it as well," Hibiki said. "Or me. Any of the above is encouraging."

Ranma shook his head. "And what does the _Umi Sen-Ken _mean, then? I got that one from Pops."

The older Ryoga smiled a weird sort of smile with only half of his face. "It means you still care for your mother, Ranma."

Ranma went still and silent. Then, "it's the first thing you asked me."

"It's the most important."

"And you've got to know all that so fast because," Ryoga said, breathing still hitched, "because sometimes he's dangerous," he said, and his gaze bored into Ranma.

"I'm not," said the redhead sleepily, from Ryoga's lap.

"Shhh," Hibiki said, running his fingers through her hair, that gentle tug that made Ranma shiver in remembered sympathy that was, had to be, entirely imaginary. "Go to sleep."

Ranma gazed at his hands in his lap. "Sometimes we're… uh, really _enemies_? But you're still alive. So that means that _you_ actually won for once, which means…" He stopped, suddenly, wondering if there were things young ears shouldn't hear. It was a new thought. He lowered his voice. "Have you ever…?" He frowned in consternation. The redhead's breathing was deep and even, but he wasn't sure if she was all-the-way asleep, or just drowsing. And, for a moment, his eyes met his own Ryoga's, and there was something in them that made him hesitate to finish the thought at all. "If I was your enemy, did you ever actually... _end_ the fight?"

"Once," Hibiki said, jerking Ranma's head up to stare. "Just the once."

Ryoga turned to look at his older self, who removed his hand from the back of Ryoga's neck, slowly, then let it fall.

"Once?" Ryoga prompted.

"In the world I'm from," Hibiki replied.

Ranma swallowed, inching forward, the better to make out the boys' expressions. "_Your_ world? How'd you ever trust – if we started off as enemies, didn't you always think I would –" He stopped, wishing words didn't slip out of his reach just when he needed them. How could it be that he could push off the ground, twist a half-dozen times through the air, but could not make that same air fill his lungs, push past his vocal cords and _make sense_?

"We all trusted each other at first," the older boy said, placing a protective hand atop the redhead's coppery locks, then raising his eyes to Ranma's. "It was easier than you'd think, to trust you again. Even after that."

Ranma could barely breathe. "But… when she… he... _kami-sama!_ When _Ranma_ was in trouble, you still…"

Hibiki's hand came up to cup his cheek mid-word, then fell to his side again.

Ranma forgot entirely what he was going to say. He fell back on his haunches, the echo of the man's touch buzzing against his skin.

"You deserve a chance, same as anyone," Ryoga said, and his voice sounded fierce. "Everyone deserves a chance. No one should have to fight their way through life the way the two of us have." He lifted his hand again to find the back of his counterpart's neck.

Ranma followed the motion with his gaze, landing on the younger Ryoga's face, which had gone from white to flushed in the space of a moment; tears were gathering in his eyes. "Whoa, P-chan!" he exclaimed, flushing, himself. _Guys don't cry_, he thought, desperately, as if the thought would somehow stop Ryoga from showing any emotion at all. _But I should know better. This is Ryoga, after all._

"Okay," Hibiki said, drawing Ryoga to him until their foreheads rested together. "Just… shhh… Ranma's asleep."

Ryoga nodded, nodding Hibiki's head, too, because they were pressed together. "It's just… no one's ever said… that I deserve anything," he said, heavy breaths between each phrase. "My problems are… a joke, to everyone else…"

"That's not true," Hibiki said. "Ranma's your friend. I can tell. Aren't you, Ranma?" He turned to face Ranma, and the younger Ryoga hung there for a moment, without support, head hanging low and breathing ragged.

Ranma gulped. "Uh, yeah. Sure," he replied. The free display of emotion was still making his skin crawl. He wondered how he could escape. Out the window was looking good. He doubted either Ryoga would accept an offer to spar, although he figured it might be interesting to fight Hibiki, just to see what he could do. Maybe he could be tactful, just once in this life, if he planned out what he was going to say beforehand. Like _maybe I should leave you guys alone_, or _it looks like you've got a lot to say, yeah_? But the more uncomfortable he got, the less control he had over his tongue. He was worried if he opened his mouth, he was going to go sticking his foot in it.

"_Uh, yeah, sure_, he says," Ryoga said, then shuddered, as though the bitterness had left his body in the form of a physical substance, and he needed to shake it off his skin.

"Ranma, maybe we should speak in the morning," Hibiki said.

Ranma jumped to his feet so eagerly he stumbled. "Uh, yeah, so… see ya later. Sleep well and… glad you're better," fell out of his mouth, vocal cords working faster than his brain like always, "we were so worried, I, the kid, I was so worried I was gonna mess her up, just like Pops –" He stopped, swallowed. _What am I saying?_ "I _am_ your friend," he blurted to the younger Ryoga, and stumbled out of Akane's room before he could do worse damage, closing the door behind him.

* * *

That night, Ranma woke with a gasp. Maybe it was unfulfilled habit to check on the kid that made him wake, heart still pounding in his ears. Maybe if he made sure she was okay, he'd be able to stop his pulse from thrumming behind his eyes. He launched himself out of his bedroll and crept out of the guest room and up the stairs.

The duck nameplate reading _Akane_ gave him pause. He'd always hesitated to go into Akane's room at all, and now here he was getting ready to go in without even knocking. He tapped quietly on the door with one finger, just in case the two boys were still talking to one another, but he got no response.

He cracked the door open and entered, closing it behind him, then turned to look for the kid. But Ranma ended up standing on the threshold a long moment, breath held.

Hibiki was in the center of the bed, pale but healthy enough, lashes fluttering in dreams. The small redhead was cradled in one of his extended arms, her red hair pooling over his shoulder. Every now and then she would hitch a tiny, unhappy breath that sounded like a whine, and Hibiki's arm would tighten around her in sleep. Instinctive. Ranma had expected a picture like this, but it made him feel oddly claustrophobic, as if he were the one pressed between Hibiki Ryoga and Akane's bedroom wall instead of the tiny redhead. But even that bypassed Ranma's hierarchy of Facts Worthy of Note. Because on their other side was _Ryoga, _curled towards his counterpart's larger form, features more childlike in repose than Ranma had never seen them. Hibiki's arm was thrown around him, too, and the three of them looked… looked…

_Like an o__lder brother with his little brother and sister_, Ranma thought. _Like an u__ncle with his niece and nephew._

_Like a father and son. Father and daughter_.

Ranma felt the panic clawing up his throat again, inexplicable, horrible. Drowning him.

He must have made some noise, because Hibiki's eyes opened to stare at him.

Ranma couldn't say anything. His mouth no longer worked; it had come entirely unhooked from his brain.

Hibiki extended one hand, forward. Palm open. Inviting Ranma to grasp it; to be swallowed by what he saw.

_No. No. NO!_

Ranma stumbled backward out the door and then out into the street, and then he was running, a phrase running in an endless loop through his mind: _yǒu qí fù bì yǒu qí zǐ, _the meaning dancing, sliding away like water through his fingers.

* * *

A/N:

* * *

Whew. Okay, so it's a week and a DAY, ladies and gentlemen, but you must admit that this chapter is twice as long as the previous one. ;) And a bit of a long author's notes this time around as well!

**Chinese:**

I do NOT speak Chinese. Not even close. So if you do, or if you know someone who does, perhaps you could let me know if anything I've written makes no sense at all.

Shampoo says something along the lines of, "if you wouldn't run all the time, I wouldn't have to chase you."

Shampoo calls Ranma 'little sister'. She does it in an affectionate way; the same way Japanese people end names with '-chan' to imply cuteness/affection, the Chinese repeat syllables. So 'Mei' is little sister, but 'Mei-mei' is more affectionate.

What Ranma has looping through his head is a Chinese proverb: _such a son could only have come from such a father_, or, in American parlance, the apple doesn't fall far from the tree.

**Gender Pronouns:**

I've gotten a few comments about using 'he' no matter what. I use 'he' because gender is in the brain and is a function of identity. Ranma's sex changes in hot and cold water, but Ranma's gender is male: period. At least, for this version of Ranma that's the case, at this moment in time. I think, as Ranma ages, he'll probably stop thinking of himself as male _or_ female, or he'll start thinking of himself as both; but this hasn't happened, yet.

Contrast in this chapter the fact that Ranma-ue can't help but think of his counterpart as a girl or guy depending on what form s/he's wearing, and thinking of hir with the pronoun that he believes 'fits', getting frustrated when he uses the 'wrong' one by accident.

**Ranma's memory:**

I really do like to hear speculation. For example, I expect everyone has a pretty clear idea of why Ranma's memory is shifting, at least basically. But why aren't others remembering Ranma differently?

And, as always, what did you think of the chapter in general? I really appreciate your feedback!

-K


	11. Character

ELEVEN: CHARACTER

* * *

Ranma felt that horrible rise inside of him, like a bigger, stronger opponent staring him down, getting ready to knock him to the dirt. He didn't want to be in the house when it broke, so he flew down the stairs, bare feet thwapping against the smooth wood, and fled without bothering to put on shoes.

Outside, the cool air shocked him into alertness. The sky was cloudless, putting on a light show even in the glare of the streetlamps, and the moon was a bright sliver coin in the western sky. The panic clawing at his insides sidled back a step when Ranma slowed to an amble, gazing up.

He decided to walk the bay along the path that led to Furinkan. He leapt up on the fence, did a few somersaults along it, just for fun. Stood on his hand, flipping both feet up into the air, his body a taut curve in the moonlight.

"Hey, Ranma!"

Ranma wobbled in surprise, then tipped over into the bay. He stood up in the water to peer up to the railing above. Akane was there, wearing a nightgown, houseslippers, and a robe thrown over for modesty's sake. "Hey, tomboy, what'd you have to go and surprise me like that for?"

Akane had one hand to her mouth, either to convey chagrin or to cover up laughter, Ranma wasn't sure. "Sorry, Ranma, sorry!" she exclaimed. "I thought you of all people would've heard me coming!"

"No, I didn't, thanks," Ranma said, wringing his tang out, red pigtail turned auburn in the wet.

"Well, I said I was sorry," Akane said, folding her arms across her chest.

Ranma climbed up out of the water and sprung off of solid ground to do a mid-air flip and land beside Akane. "What're you doin' awake anyway?"

"You weren't exactly quiet heading out of the house."

Ranma examined Akane in the moonlight. He thought he might like her best like this, when they were totally alone, and it was quiet, because Akane almost always only yelled when there were other people around, these days. It was kind of nice she'd gone after Ranma, and when she did things like that – when she tilted her head just a little and her eyes got all warm – he could _almost_ see what all those idiots who chased Akane were looking at. _Almost_.

She smiled. "What?"

"Nothin'," Ranma replied. "Just – sorry I woke you, I guess."

"Well, it's not like I could sleep either," she admitted. "Things are more weird than usual, you know?"

"No kiddin'!" Ranma exclaimed. "Beyond weird." Ranma eyed Akane a moment, then joined her in leaning on the railing overlooking the bay. A companionable silence fell as they took in the shining moon and the beautiful stars, and Ranma tried to blank his mind, not think about anything at all. He tried to empty his worries out into the bay, like spilled water.

"What do you think is going to happen to Ranma, now that Ryoga's awake?" Akane asked, weaving the moment insistently back into the warp and weft of reality.

Ranma eyed her a moment, then leaned back on the railing, so that he wouldn't have to look Akane in the eye. "I dunno."

"Well…" Akane said, trying to duck into Ranma's field of vision, "you've got to know. Forgive me for saying so, but your dad isn't exactly the responsible, nurturing type –"

"I turned out just fine!" Ranma snapped.

"I never said you didn't, Ranma. I'm just trying to say, that if you had to start all over again, would you really want Genma Saotome looking after you?"

Ranma only heard the first part of what Akane said. "You always say I didn't. Grow up right, I mean. I ain't got no modesty. I'm a pervert an' a show-off. And my best friend is Ryoga, who tries to kill me the second Thursday of every month. Ain't those your lines, Akane?"

"I never… well… but…" Akane stammered, flushing. "But, I mean, you did turn out all right," she said in a very small voice.

"Right." Ranma folded his arms across his chest. "Except for all the things you call me, an' all the troubles I got." He narrowed his eyes. "I know I don't talk like you do, Akane, and I don't have so much education, 'cause I traveled around, but you gotta know I'm no fool. You don't hate me anymore, but that doesn't mean I don't know what you think of_ how I turned out_."

Akane pressed her lips together, seemed to search for inspiration from the sky and the bay. After a moment, she tentatively placed her warm palm on Ranma's upper back and curled her fingers around the redhead's shoulder. "That isn't true," she said, "because you haven't turned out, yet, really. Neither have I. We're not _done yet_, Ranma. There's plenty of time to learn to be refined and grown-up. And, besides… I kind of like your rough edges. Sometimes."

Ranma turned to face her. "I… guess. Thanks, Akane."

She smiled, but the expression slid away. "But… Ranma. I mean… about the little boy…"

Ranma kicked at the dirt, feeling a rising frustration that finally broke around his feet like a wave crashing against rock. "Hell, I wouldn't give Pops a puppy to raise," he confessed in a rush. "Which," he added, barking a cynical laugh, "really does say a lot about _me_. Damn it." He slumped over the railing with a sigh.

"So who _would_ you trust, Ranma? I have a feeling it's all going to come down to what you think is best." She eyed Ranma. "Would _you_ want to raise him?"

"'Course not," Ranma answered automatically, then paused. He pictured taking the kid on training trips, showing him martial arts moves, which plants you could eat in the woods, how to set a snare. The picture was surprisingly solid in his mind. Much clearer than a future marriage or owning a dojo or finishing his education seemed to be when he tried to visualize how they'd go. "I mean… maybe it wouldn't be so weird," he admitted. "Maybe… I mean, I gotta be practical, I ain't got no way to support a kid, but…"

"But if you did, you would?" Akane pressed. "Wow."

Ranma looked up expecting to see a cynical Akane, but instead, he was rewarded with an Akane fairly glowing with approbation. He guessed wishing he could look after the kid was impressive to her, somehow.

"Is there anybody else you'd trust?" she said.

Ranma shrugged. "The old ghoul doesn't seem like she's doin' such a terrible job. I guess. An' Ryoga…"

"Really? You'd trust Ryoga?"

Ranma turned to look at her. "The older Ryoga's... real good with the kid. And the kid loves him." Ranma nearly swallowed his tongue in shock at what he'd said.

"Don't act so surprised; I think so, too," Akane said.

Ranma's cheeks felt hot. "B-b-but –"

"Well, it's only natural," Akane said, flipping her short hair out of her eyes. "Ryoga saved his life, and took good care of him. More than that, Ryoga was good _to _him. And _for_ him." She paused, fiddling with the tie of her robe. "Do you think Ryoga loves Ranma, too?"

Ranma swallowed, eyes sliding away from Akane, thinking, _what does she want, _and_ how can she ask a question like that?_

"Come on, Ranma, it's not a trick," she said, softly, when the pause stretched for more than a beat. "I'm just trying to help you figure out what's best for the little boy. That's all. _Really_," she tacked on, lowering her voice to a whisper and curling her fingers around Ranma's shoulder again.

"I… I don't know. How'm I supposed to know how someone else feels, anyway? I ain't a mind-reader, Akane."

Akane seemed surprised by his disavowal, and he watched the signs he'd long since learned to check for: the way that her lips pressed together, the way her eyes widened a bit in challenge, the way her fists clenched. "Ranma Saotome," she said, "_I am just trying to help you_."

"Well… it ain't helping to ask me questions I can't answer!" Ranma shouted, and realized he had a handful of Akane's robe clutched in his fist and backed away quickly, two jogging steps. He thought – he might have shaken her. Just a little, not even enough to jar her, but he hadn't known he was about to, and – this was turning into some kind of nightmare. "I… I gotta go."

"Ranma… Ranma, it's okay…" Akane said. "Oh, for heaven's sake. Come here." She approached him and gripped his girl shoulders with both hands. "Look at me. Look me in the eye."

Ranma was finding it hard to obey. Shame consumed him. What was he, that he had gone to _shake Akane_, when she'd hit him and belittled him in the past, when she was just trying to be nice, now? What kind of monster did that make him? But she held on and held on and eventually he had to meet her eyes.

They were warm, steady brown. "Good," she said. "You didn't hurt me. You weren't going to hurt me. You're upset, not angry. You just won't _realize _it."

Ranma thought of the building tension in him, the way it threatened to rattle out of him as tears and now violence. Or the hint of it, which was more than he'd ever shown to Akane. He'd never even raised his hand to her in jest. "…upset?" he repeated, and hearing it in that soft, girly voice his redheaded form put on when she was thoughtful or intrigued made him shiver.

"Of course," Akane said. "It's got to be hard, watching the two of them."

"…it does?" The voice again, only it sounded husky, now, a threat of tears. The idea that Akane or Nabiki or Kasumi might be able to unlock what was wrong with him had never occurred to him, though maybe it should have. A casualty of living life on the road, he guessed, thinking of help last of all. "W-why do you think it's so hard?"

Akane's lip twitched, and she huffed in sympathy. "Maybe if I frame it in my terms. My mother shows up with a de-aged version of me."

"That'd be rough," Ranma said in immediate sympathy. "You never had her around, growing up, and you'd have to watch her take care of a younger _you_ and…" Ranma blinked. Then again, shaking his head. "You think I'm _jealous_?"

Akane seemed taken aback. "Would you have called me jealous in that situation?"

"Of _course_ not," Ranma said, appalled. "I'd say you…"

Akane's arms slid down Ranma's to grip his smaller girl-hands. "Finish the thought," she said, very gently.

Ranma shook his head, biting his lip.

"Then I will," Akane said. "You'd say I was longing for something I should've had, when it was put on display in front of me, but I couldn't touch it. You'd say I was _grieving_. That's what you're doing, Ranma. You're looking at Ryoga take care of that child, and you're thinking, _that could have been me_. And it hurts that it wasn't."

Ranma felt like Akane had peeled back several layers of skin and exposed them to the cool night air. He began to shiver. For once, he had no worries he would say the wrong thing; his mind felt empty, like the solid foundation of his thought patterns had been shattered. _Bakusai tenketsu_, he thought.

"…how bad was it, really?" Akane said in a quiet voice. "With your father, when you were small?"

Ranma's gaze fell on the robe Akane wore, because he couldn't look Akane in the face, again. "Fine," he said. "I mean… sure, we didn't eat a lot, but hardship breeds strength, you know? And a _lot_ of the time, the techniques were dangerous, but that was to become a Man Amongst Men, which has always been real important to Pops. And to me," he added, eyes faraway. "And there were the times he sold me off, 'cause we didn't have any food or nothin', but," he said, with a self-conscious grin, "he always came back, didn't he? And he didn't teach me nothin' but the art an' survival skills, I mean, sometimes I feel like a real dunce, ya know? I mean, he said 'real martial artists don't sit in classrooms', but then the social services people finally caught up to us and do you know who taught me to read in the end?"

Akane's hands squeezed his, because he still wasn't looking at her; not really.

"_Hibiki Ryoga_!" Ranma exclaimed, with a laugh. "It was our deal, I'd lead him to and from school and he'd teach me the basics, I could write my name and make out a handful of Chinese and less than that of Japanese when I got into junior high, but that was it, and I didn't want anybody to think I belonged on the special bus. So he showed me, made each character into a _character_, get it?, with its own personality, an' I never forgot any of it ever again –"

"Ranma," Akane said, ducking to try to meet his eyes. "Are you telling me you couldn't write until you were twelve?"

"Yeah, barely, anyhow. Pathetic, huh?" Ranma said. "No one else knows. Ryoga never told, not anybody." For the first time, Ranma directly connected that to his own silence regarding Ryoga's curse. _Huh._

"No, but, I mean…" Akane squeezed his hands again in hers. "That's really fantastic, the way you managed to pick it up so late… For you to have come so far, so fast…"

"I know. I'm really clever," Ranma said, dully. "I mean, I always knew I could learn techniques real fast, but I thought that was just dumb muscle. But the kid proves it, I was really smart back then. Pops coulda taught me all kindsa things, an' I would've soaked it up like a sponge. Instead, there's all this _stuff_ I don't know, can't figure out. My brain won't work the way I want it at all, sometimes. Have you seen the kid play with numbers? He makes my head hurt."

Akane released his hands to place her fists firmly on her hips. "There's no reason why you can't do those things now, Ranma. If you devoted a quarter of the time to your homework that you did to martial arts, you'd be top of our class in no time. You've already said you've got the raw material, so no more feeling sorry for yourself."

Ranma felt as though the inside of his mind had been scoured clean with a rough brush and rinsed with clear water. He was sure, now, that all the babble he'd just lobbed at Akane was the same species that he'd whispered to himself in the dark that night he'd felt so… _unhinged…_ the night he'd seen Ryoga comforting a little redhead after a nightmare. Filling in that weird, emotional amnesia with something that made sense flooded Ranma with relief. His mind tossed the idea around a bit, that he felt _grief_ and _loss_ when he saw how Ryoga took care of little Ranma, and it seemed to fit with the stabbing sensation that had lodged itself in his chest ever since the two had arrived.

He knew, also, that he owed the kid an apology for not stepping in when Pops had been a jerk. But Ranma now knew why he hadn't: if he was going to stand up for the kid against his father, that meant standing up for himself. Saying it aloud would mean admitting his father had done terrible things to him, and that would had been like admitting he was damaged goods. Although, now that he was pretty much doing that, it didn't feel so bad.

Felt kind of good, really. A relief.

"The kid can't end up with Pops again," he said grimly. "He might figure he could start from scratch, make a better Man Against Men than me. You gotta admit, it might seem a pretty package to Pops, a new Saotome Ranma all wrapped up in a little bow. Young… impressionable…" And Ranma found that, when he said this, he felt the faint prick of jealousy – but his fear for the kid felt overwhelming in comparison. He could only imagine what Genma might do with that second chance.

Akane frowned. "If that's the case, it's funny he let Ranma go off with Cologne," she said. "Maybe he thinks that Shampoo has got a Saotome Ranma and so she's one less fiancee to worry about."

Ranma gaped. "The kid's not at any age to agree to a thing like that!" he exclaimed.

Akane eyed him, shocked, for a full ten seconds before folding nearly in half over the railing, choked with laughter. "Oh! Oh, Ranma!"

Ranma joined her after a moment. "Yeah, yeah, tomboy, all right, it ain't _that _funny. I know I didn't get no say in any of it, either."

A second silence fell, but this one was less the quiet of peace, and more the calm before the storm. If the old man had messed with the kid's head just to get him to leave the Tendos' and fulfill one of the Saotome contracts…

_ You'll what? _Ranma wondered. _Tell him off? Fight him? And what'll that do, huh?_

"I'm sure you'll do the right thing," Akane said, gaze flitting over his face. "You always try to. And I promise to help."

Ranma swallowed. "Akane…"

"Let's walk back. I'm tired, now."

"Yeah, Akane. And… uh, thanks."

"Thanks for what?"

Ranma struggled to find the words. "Um, for… listenin' to me, I guess."

Akane smiled her best, sunniest smile. "You bet!" The smile faded. "If you ever wanna talk, you know, let's just meet at midnight, like this. It'll be our secret, yeah?"

Ranma laughed. "Right, it's the only way we'd ever have a conversation without anybody else butting in!"

Akane paled. "Suppose Nabiki or Daddy got up for a cup of water and noticed _we're both missing at the same time_?"

The pair curled over with giggles and "_Shhhhhh!_"s, trying to keep from waking anyone in the residential neighborhood.

"You didn't mention Kasumi or Pops," Ranma commented.

"Your father would sleep through Armageddon," Akane replied, "and Kasumi would say _oh my, I do hope they're having FUN together_."

Ranma giggled again, bumping shoulders with Akane playfully. "Well, all right, I don't know if it could be called _fun_, exactly, but it was… uh, interesting?"

"Gee thanks," Akane replied, drawing down her eyelid and sticking her tongue out.

They reached the gate to the Tendo Dojo and grounds and paused, and the crazy thought ran through Ranma's head that despite his bare feet and Akane's robe, this was almost like the end of a date where both parties had a 'nice time'. He tried to ignore that thought by sweeping a tide of patter ahead of him. "What're you waitin' on, tomboy? I thought you just said you were tired, or were you just tired of me?"

Akane shook her head. "Listen," she said, but then didn't say anything, next. "Listen."

"I'm listening, but you're silent as the grave," Ranma quipped. Then, when Akane's lips pressed together and her eyes _squinted_ and her fists clenched, Ranma knew Akane was sad. "What?" he said. "What is it?"

"This is the last time you'll see me for awhile," Akane replied.

"What?" Ranma half-turned back to the gate, as if to point out to Akane that they both lived in the same house.

"I'll make sure she remembers tonight, though, except for this last part here. It's so _important_. It's the least I can do."

Ranma began to feel distinctly uneasy. "Akane… what're you talkin' about?" He sidled forward to see her face better. "What's goin' on?"

"You met me a long time ago," Akane said, stepping into Ranma's space. "You don't remember it, but –"

Ranma stumbled back. "You're her. You're the spirit of the springs. You –" Flashes of memory assaluted him as he fell back against the gate: Akane's long legs behind him and her warm steadiness, _I guess you're meant to be here_, _my spring carries my form but also _who I am_, seriously, are you promising yourself to girls at _this_ age?_ Ranma slumped to the ground, blinking at the familiar streetlights and the rough grain of the pebbles embedded in the sidewalk before _YOU STAY RIGHT THERE I'M COMING TO GET YOU_, and Akane floating up above the pools, expression earnest and tolerant, that big-sister smile he was really getting to like, the anxiety, was he _really_ the sort of boy who had a bunch of girls on a string no he _couldn't be_ but he had to be sure. _Sorry, Ranma, it's a bit much to deal with all at once. You haven't noticed that Ryoga has trouble finding his way? Well, Ranma, it's simple – you've got to be honest –_

"Ranma – Ranma!" Akane was on her knees in front of him, gripping his wrists in her hands.

Ranma stared at the wrists; at the hands attached to them. The fingers were small and slender; the wrists were white and delicate-looking in the moonlight. He realized all over again that he was in the girl-form just now, which he could have sworn he'd never forget. For one thing, Akane's lips were a different kind of pink when he was –

_What?_ Ranma shook his head. Something about red, he was remembering something about the color red, but that was –

Akane's face, changing, warping – the screams of the animal-men – Ryoga, _no, no Ryoga!_, the way he twitched and writhed on the ground and then went deathly still. _Oh no, oh no, Ryoga, I can't carry you and Akane can't carry you – _

_HELP! HELP!_

Ranma saw – remembered – _saw –_ his own face. He was perched on the dojo roof, looking down, and his expression was exasperated, bored, tired, a hint of weirded out. The Ranma looking down on him had seen it all before, and so remained unimpressed and unmoved; the little girl below him was just another irritating complication.

Ranma crouched on the roof unmoved at the same time as he was panic-stricken, panting, wet with tears and unworthy of interest standing just below.

"Shhh, shhh," Akane whispered, wiping at his face.

Ranma realized his cheeks were wet. "W-what? What _was_…?"

"I don't know," Akane said, stroking his cheeks dry and rocking back on her haunches. "I don't know everything."

"But you said you live in all times at once," Ranma blurted, then shivered – _shouldn't know that, I shouldn't – _"So… I mean, couldn't you… look ahead?"

"Nothing like this ever happens," Akane said. She frowned. "Language just isn't built for these conversations." She took a breath and tried again. "You're the only Ranma to ever travel to a place where there's another Ranma, so I don't have experience in situations like this one. And like I said, I won't see you for awhile again after this, so existing in many times at once doesn't help, because I'm not around for what happens, next."

"I'm _becoming him_, aren't I?" Ranma whispered. "Maybe… it wouldn't be so bad."

Akane shook her head. "No, Ranma," she said, voice just as low, just as solemn. "He's a wonderful child. But you're not… less than him. You're you, and that's good. Very good," she said, flushing prettily in the moonlight. "I like your rough edges… remember?"

Ranma huffed a laugh. "Yes. I remember."

"You don't look very convinced."

Ranma rolled his eyes. "We just finished saying what a louse Pops is, an' how he should never be given a _houseplant_ to look after. We both know I'm damaged goods, and maybe it'd be better if I just let this _fix_ me, right?"

Akane stared. She fidgeted with her hands. "You're not going to believe me whatever I say," she said, "are you?" She leaned in close, her palms pressed to her knees.

"Whoa!" Ranma exclaimed, bringing both hands up between them. "What're you doing?"

"What does it look like I'm doing, baka?" Akane countered, and pressed forward again.

"Whoa! You're, uh, you're being awfully forward," Ranma said, then cursed himself. What decade was he from, again?

"Ranma," Akane said, one eyebrow raised, "in plenty of realities we're married. And we get up to the things that married people do. It's hardly what feels like the first time, for me."

"But, I mean, I'm a g-girl right now," Ranma stammered.

Akane's smile turned wobbly at the edges. "Yeah," she whispered, using one hand to cradle Ranma's cheek. "So _cute_," she said, and pressed her lips to Ranma's.

Ranma felt soft lips meet his own, warm and alive as anything he'd ever felt. Akane's hand moved to the back of his hair and cupped his skull, maneuvering her lips between his and giving his lower lip a second little peck before withdrawing. It was a familiar kiss, the kiss of someone who was sure of her partner, and it was comforting and sexy and weirdly _familial_, and Ranma wasn't sure but he thought his heart might have flopped out of his chest and fallen to lie at her feet.

No, no – for that to be true, she couldn't have had it all along. And he thought she had.

Ranma realized his hands were still extended to Akane's face, that he'd had those slim, girl-fingers pressed to Akane's cheeks and clenched in her hair. "What'd you do that for?" she whispered.

Akane smiled. "You're worth it, Saotome Ranma," she said, low, intimate, as they pressed together close enough to share breath. "Don't lose yourself, okay?"

"O-okay," he said. "But I – I'm a girl. You k-k-kissed me, when…"

"Oh, Ranma!" she exclaimed, with a tinkling, startled laugh. "Are you still on about _that_? Or just fishing for compliments?" She smiled, indulgent. "You're beautiful like this, you have to know that."

Ranma could feel his cheeks heat; he could barely manage to look Akane in the eye. This wasn't how he'd pictured kissing Akane.

"Yeah, I mean, I guess, but it was always… uh, _theoretical_," Ranma muttered, rubbing at the back of his neck. "Sanzenin don't count."

Akane smiled at him, her form flickering. "Gotta go," she said. "Call me if you need me. And take care of yourself, Saotome Ranma."

It was only once he was staring through emptiness that once held his uncute fiancee that he realized that could be taken in more than one way.

A/N:

* * *

Well, folks, it's another chapter!

I really appreciated your comments last time; they spurred and encouraged me to continue writing. Dare I say they inspired? And I'll really need that as we head once again into the school year.

Keep reading, keep writing everybody!


	12. Man

TWELVE: Man

* * *

When Ranma woke, he lay perfectly still in his bedroll, trying to sort dream from reality. He'd gotten up to _I think Akane is a ghost and also alive _when his contemplation was broken by the entry of tiny!Ranma, who ran across the room and flopped dramatically over Ranma's stomach, arms and legs trailing to the tatami mats on either side. "Hiya!" he announced brightly. "It's time for breakfast! It's our _favorite_!"

Ranma sighed, and then chuckled as the dark mood slid off of him, left behind on the bedroll as he amused the kid by sitting and standing while keeping the child in the exact same position as before. "Tell me," he said, "did you sleep at _all_?"

"Like the dead!" Ranma said, curling himself around Ranma like a donut until Ranma shifted him up to a more comfortable position against his hip. "Until three, anyway," the child muttered. "You?"

"Dunno," Ranma replied. "Seems like I had a lot of dreams."

"Oh, me too," said Ranma, and lay his head onto his counterpart's shoulder. "Some scary ones. But Ryoga and Ryoga were there, so that was all right."

"This is about to get confusing, isn't it?" Ranma muttered, shifting the kid on his hip. "What're we gonna be called, Ranma, Ranma, and Ryoga squared?"

"Oh! I get that. Because there are two of us!" Ranma exclaimed, and wriggled to the floor to run ahead of Ranma. "Hey, Ryoga. Ranma says you're squared!"

"Does he," said older Ryoga from his position at the table, looking up with grave eyes. "That's very clever."

Ranma found himself weirdly embarrassed. _Shut up, P-chan_, he thought, but again, the appellation wouldn't quite pass his lips. He wondered what it was about this version of Ryoga that made him watch his language so carefully. Maybe it was that one of the first things he'd ever asked Ranma to do was _stay very quiet for me and answer only when I give you the nod…_

Ranma shook himself. That wasn't right. The first thing Ryoga had asked him to do was to _prepare to die_. His gaze swung to Hibiki's right, where the younger Ryoga was seated, head ducked, as quiet as he normally was around Akane – although the youngest Tendo wasn't in evidence, yet. Kasumi was still bustling in and out of the kitchen, readying the table. Tendo Soun sat at the table's head, wreathed in pipe-smoke and reading a newspaper.

Ranma kind of wondered if that was some sort of prop to avoid looking at the situation. He wouldn't mind having something to hide behind, either.

"Come _on_, it's umeboshi and okayu and tamagoyaki!" little Ranma exclaimed, snagging Ranma's hand and leaning backwards.

"Yeesh, okay, kid," Ranma said. "I'm comin'." He sat down at the table across from both Ryogas; Ranma ran to sit on Hibiki's other side and wormed his way under the young man's arm. Hibiki didn't seem to mind, just shifted his stance to allow the boy half into his lap. Ryoga peered at this, then settled into consuming his porridge, wordless.

"Hey, P-chan, what's shakin'?" Ranma inquired.

Ryoga's head lifted, and he made eye contact. He looked as though he hadn't slept very well, either: dark circles framed each eye, which held a hint of typical Ryoga-madness, when the other boy'd gotten too much in his head. "Well, Ranma, let's see. I was looking after my greatest rival in child-form, when an older version of me called me to his bedside to explain that I'd actually murdered my rival, who's kind of also my friend. So I'm _processing_, if you can understand a word that long."

Hibiki lifted his hand to take hold of the back of his younger counterpart's neck, just as he had the night before. Ryoga's head fell forward and Ranma could see the man's thumb pushing along a stubborn tendon, followed by soothing sweeps. He'd never seen such an unconscious or immediate display of domination and surrender before, especially not in the context of… he wasn't sure. _Care_, he supposed. It made him want to look away, but this time, he didn't. And this time, instead of that stab of grief, he felt… glad for Ryoga.

"Here we are," Kasumi said, depositing the last dish, a steaming bowl of miso soup, onto the breakfast table. "Ranma, why don't you call Nabiki and Akane for breakfast?"

"Okay," both Ranmas said simultaneously.

"Little Ranma?" Kasumi prompted, and the small child darted for the stairs. "Ranma, perhaps you'll bring your father," Kasumi went on. "He's doing kata outside."

"Yeah," Ranma said, and pushed to a standing position. He almost wanted to let the old man practice through breakfast. He didn't think he could look Genma in the face after some of his revelations last night, and he _really _didn't want to let his father near the kid, because…

Ranma sighed. He had to allow himself to _think_ it, even if he wasn't about to say it: he didn't want to let Genma around the kid because Genma was a bad.. he was bad around kids. He hurt the kid's feelings, he called the kid _imaginary_, he implied that Ranma himself was a fool for looking _after_ the kid. He sent the kid off to the old ghoul, maybe angling for a way out of one of Ranma's arranged marriages. _Used_ the kid.

That made him a _bad father_, and kind of a _bad person_.

Weirdly, the entire dojo did not come crashing down about Ranma's ears for thinking this; the earth didn't crack open and swallow him. Instead, Ranma began to feel a hair more resolute than worried.

It felt like an improvement.

* * *

"Hey, Pops! Breakfast time!" Ranma shouted, and ducked back inside before he had to see his father's face.

Breakfast was a quiet affair at first, with no one quite knowing what to say. Kasumi served food, and seemed serene enough, but Akane picked at her food, the younger Ryoga Hibiki still seemed in a wooden sort of shock, and Nabiki's sharp eyes kept swinging around the table, trying to take in everyone's features at once. Soun ruffled his newspaper and his food disappeared off his plate at a regular rate; beyond that, there was not much of his behavior to observe.

Little Ranma seemed cheerful, though, just as he had at the start of the day. He grinned at everyone and, in a feat of what Ranma would call 'maturity' if he weren't doing the exact same thing, himself, behaved as though Saotome Genma did not exist.

Eventually, Hibiki cleared his throat and turned to little Ranma, still half on his lap. "Has Elder Cologne been keeping you busy?" he said.

"Well," Ranma temporized, "there sure aren't as many chores here. Nothing to water or weed and no errands to run. But sometimes I sweep an' sometimes I even serve customers." He wrinkled his nose. "They think it's _cute_, though, which is a little annoying."

Ranma's father would have rolled his eyes at this news, but Hibiki seemed to find it of grave import.

"Oh? Well, I can see how that might be so," he agreed. "But I meant you to tell me what you've learned."

Little Ranma squirmed in his seat. "Well. Not much," he admitted. "Elder Cologne doesn't know what I know, and I don't remember what everything's called. So she keeps showing me things and saying _can you do this yet?_ and I tell her 'yes' or 'no, ma'am'. Ryoga's been helping a lot."

Ryoga squirmed in his seat almost identically to the child. "Um," he said.

"I know I thanked you already," Hibiki said, taking in everyone at the table, "but I can't say what a relief it is knowing that he was all right. That Ranma was with people who had his best interests at heart."

Genma snorted, and little Ranma flinched, a beat behind. "I assume he's learned _some_ martial arts along with all this science and math and _poetry_," Genma said.

Akane and Nabiki looked to Hibiki, who smiled urbanely and said nothing.

"C'mon, Pops, don't be so… _narrow_," Ranma said. "I remember, you used to teach me that stuff too." Ranma took a quick sip of his tea so that he would not have to meet his father's gaze.

"I did no such thing," Genma grumbled.

"If you think that, you've got a crap memory, Pops," Ranma said. "Listen: '_the autumn wind of evening blows away the clouds that mass over the moon's purest light; and those that cloud our minds you sweep away too. Now, we disappear - well – what do we think of it? From the sky we came. Now, we may go back again. Or so some say.' _ Hôjô Ujimasa."

Ranma looked up from his tea to see that everyone was staring with varying degrees of shock. "Hey, it's not _Heike Monogatari_," he defended. "It's a death poem. A few lines. Kami-sama," he said, frustrated with the stares. "I'm not an idiot, all right?" he bit out. "I can memorize a few _words_ in a row!" Damn it, he was upsetting the kid. He could see the child twisting his napkin in his hands, and Hibiki was too busy staring at him to notice.

"Forgive us if we're not used to you spouting poetry over breakfast," Nabiki deadpanned. "Even you've got to admit it's a little unusual, Ranma."

"I never taught you samurai poetry," Genma growled. "Waste of time, if you ask me."

Kasumi smiled prettily. "Why, and here I'd always thought the samurai ideal was cultured, Uncle Saotome."

"Well, just look at Ranma's education until he arrived here with us, Kasumi," Nabiki said. "He wasn't exactly cultured, was he? Which just goes to show what _Uncle_ Saotome values."

"So how _did_ you learn the poetry, then, Ranma?" Akane wondered.

Ranma frowned. He distinctly remembered repeating the lines, again and again. Discussing the meaning at length after the memorization was complete. He looked up and caught the older Hibiki Ryoga's eye.

The man looked slightly sheepish.

"_You_ taught me – him – poetry?" Ranma said.

"Some," Hibiki said. "Hold on." He rose from the table, returning moments later with a battered, slender volume with a blue, beaten paper cover only slightly thicker than the pages. He handed it to Ranma, who turned it over in his hands.

It was familiar. Ranma could remember curling up, head tucked against someone's warm chest – Ryoga's – the older boy's voice measured, sonorous. _Whether a man passes on or remains – it is all the same. That you can take no one with you is the only difference._ With trembling fingers, Ranma flipped to the fourth page where those selfsame words were printed on cheap typepaper, and read _two awakenings and one sleep_ and remembered Ryoga discussing with him how this meant the samurai must have died at sunrise. The pages were well-worn, much-beloved. Ranma closed the book and turned it over and over in his hands; even the texture was familiar against his fingers.

No one at the table spoke, even little Ranma. Soun was a rustling bit of newspaper and a wreath of pipesmoke, but everyone else's eyes were on Ranma.

"Thanks," Ranma croaked, handing the volume back across the table.

"It's my favorite," little Ranma piped up.

Ranma closed his eyes.

"Don't tell me that you're turning into some kind of womanly fool who thinks martial arts are wrapped up in poetry and flower-arranging," Genma scoffed.

Ranma swallowed, opened his eyes, faced his father. "I can't help what I remember," he said.

"You aren't _remembering_," Genma protested. "You can't be. _I _raised you, not some namby-pamby –"

Nabiki interrupted him. "Sorry, Ranma, but your father's right. You can't have _had_ two childhoods. Maybe you read the poem somewhere else."

"But I didn't," Ranma said, sick of pretending it wasn't all true. "I remember him _reading _it to me."

Genma's eyes narrowed. "I see what you're doing, boy. You're trying to conquer him by putting these womanish ideas into his head. You're trying to make him weak – don't think I don't see it."

"I'm not trying to make Ranma weak," Hibiki replied.

"You _are_," Genma countered. "It was your plan all along, wasn't it? But you can't change him," Genma said, glaring at the older Hibiki Ryoga. "You can't go _back in time_ and unmake what I've made him: the best martial artist of his generation. I won't allow you to." He stood from the table and snatched the child up by the arm; both Ryogas stood, near-simultaneously. "_Ryoga!_" little Ranma cried…

And then Genma disappeared from view.

Akane leapt to her feet.

"Lock the _doors_," said Nabiki.

But Ranma knew it was far too late. His father could move just as fast in the _Umi Sen Ken_ as he could out of it.

"No," Hibiki breathed, staring at the space where little Ranma had been.

Tendo Soun's newspaper was abandoned beside him in a pile of discarded pages, like broken-winged birds, so Ranma appealed to him, first. "Where would Pops take him?"

Soun shook his head. "I – I have no earthly idea."

"Daddy, this is not the time to beat around the bush!" Nabiki exclaimed.

"But I'm telling you all the truth," Soun replied helplessly. "This wasn't one of old Genma's _plans_, or if it was, he confided nothing in me. I believe it was a spur-of-the-moment decision."

Ranma swallowed. "It can't be. It can't be, because if it _is_, we have no way of finding him."

"Yes, we do," said Ryoga, and the spark of madness Ranma knew all too well was back in his eyes. "You have to _remember_ where he took you."

"Can you do that, Ranma?" Kasumi wondered.

Ranma looked around the circle of the table and shook his head. "No. No, I mean – I only know a few things, just a few things, and I don't even know why I know them. I can't…" He trailed off when he caught sight of Hibiki, who was still staring at the spot where little Ranma had disappeared, and breathing in a way that showed him inches from outright panic.

Ryoga's gaze darted from Ranma and to his counterpart and back again. "H-has this ever happened before? That someone had the memories of their – other self?"

"Good question," said Nabiki, and turned to stare at Ranma, although Ranma wasn't sure why.

Hibiki seemed to realize he was being addressed after a moment. "What? No, no… at least, not that any of the others told me. And… I don't know what Ryoga here knows," he said after a moment's thought.

"Then somehow," Ryoga said, "this Ranma _is_ the one that's just been kidnapped."

Everyone's gaze swung back to Ranma.

"No, it's not – _I'm _not," Ranma protested. "That kid ain't me."

Akane blinked at him. "Why _not_, Ranma?"

"Because!" Ranma shot back, desperately. "I'm not _like _that! I'm not small or helpless or okay with my girl half or smart or well-read or good at any subject in school! I stopped crying in front of other people at three or four years old! I don't speak Chinese, either, in case you hadn't caught it! And I'm not… not…" _Well cared-for, _he thought. _Gently raised_. But even agitated, he knew better than to mention that part.

"Fine," Ryoga said in a hard voice. "You're not the little boy, Ranma. We get it. But for some mystical reason, you know some of the things he knows. So maybe you could use that to help him out, huh?"

Ranma felt powerless. At a loss. "_How_?"

"I can't think _for_ you, Ranma!" Ryoga snapped. "Figure it out! What's jogged your memory before?"

Ranma blushed, but now was no time to be self-conscious. "I was spying on you the first time you comforted the kid after a nightmare," he said. "I remembered a river. Fingers carding through my hair. I – I think when the people the kid was closest to are around, I remember more." He swallowed. "That'd be you, Ryoga."

Hibiki seemed to come out of his daze. "Perhaps if I tell you some things, remind you, it might help you recall," he said.

"Sure."

"Meanwhile, I'll canvas the neighborhood," Ryoga began.

"Uh, perhaps that's not the best of ideas," Akane replied.

Ranma left the girls to talk Ryoga out of such a foolhardy plan, blocking out their bickering. "Well, shoot," Ranma said, with a sweep of his hand to indicate that the floor was Ryoga's.

Hibiki took in a breath, and began.

Books in the evening. Martial arts before lunch, and before dinner. Farming, mushroom-hunting. Fireflies at dusk and milking at dawn. Elder Cologne, Wan Da, Shampoo, and Mousse. And through every tale told, every detail of every part of the story, the thread of love was woven.

As Ranma listened, flashes of memory began to play across his mind's eye: piggyback rides and trips to the river and Wan Da's cool, calm voice like a drink of water on a sweltering day: _would you say your father never hurt you – _really _hurt you – on purpose?_ Now he knew what she'd been getting at, of course – _was your father abusive? Do you think Ryoga might be, too?_ He kind of wanted to go back in time and hug her for that. It had been weird, to go from no one really looking after him to Ryoga, and Wan Da, and Elder Cologne with his best interests at heart, not to mention the score of 'aunties' the village provided, always slipping him sweets. Old De had let he and Shampoo spar in the pumpkin patch, much to the detriment of the pumpkins. Ryoga had scolded when he'd found out, but that was fine with Ranma, since the punishment amounted to canning the ruined pumpkin, which was fun anyhow…

Ranma's father was another matter entirely. Sometimes he ignored Ranma when he'd gone against his father's wishes, and other times the punishment was harsh and terrible. Once, after the Catfist, he'd made Ranma set a bowl of milk out 'for cats' three nights in a row as punishment. Never mind that there probably _weren't_ any cats up on the mountaintop where they'd been training; it wasn't like nine-year-old Ranma had known that at the time…

Ranma's eyes flew open.

"What?" Hibiki said, taking him by the shoulders. "Did you remember something?"

Ranma swallowed. "No," he said. "I mean, yes, but – no, not anything that specific – but I think I know where Pops must've taken him."

And he must've looked so horrified, because Hibiki pulled him close and embraced him.

Ranma's arms hung loose at his sides in shock, but the clasp was meant as quick comfort, because the older boy drew back a moment later, gripping him by the shoulders. "Where?" he rasped. "Where do you think he's been taken?"

Everyone behind them was staring; Ranma watched the younger Ryoga's gaze travel to where Hibiki's fingers pressed into Ranma's shoulders, watched him swallow. Dismissed it.

"There's a mountain pass. It's hazy. I don't remember everything, but I think I could find it again."

The older Ryoga clasped Ranma to him again, briefly, swiftly. Ranma's nose fell into Ryoga's shoulder, and when he took a startled breath, the smell was achingly familiar.

When Ryoga drew back this time, Ranma found his hands half-extended, as though he'd been about to return the embrace. His fingers twitched as he let his hands fall.

"It's in Japan," Ranma said into the silence. "Kitadake, the Northern Mountain. He took me hiking there whenever I screwed up. You could bet that there was gonna be some crazy training exercises an' something to do with cats." He blinked. "Cats," he said again, blinking. Ranma brought his fingers up to his lips. "I don't have a stammer," he said, tracing them, looking up at Hibiki.

"Of course you don't," Hibiki said. "Get some gear, Ranma. Who knows how long we'll be there looking?"

"Yeah," Ranma said, and ran to the spare room.

He ransacked the place looking for travel gear. His father's stuff was already missing: no doubt he'd stashed the kid somewhere and claimed his stuff while everyone was panicking. Ranma found some interesting stuff he'd left behind, though. Some maps, a bit of jerky dropped in haste, an empty flask for water. Ranma stole it all shamelessly, and stuffed it into his own pack. He turned to find Ryoga leaning against the doorframe.

It took him a moment to figure which one.

"Porkchop," he greeted, shouldering the bag and tightening the straps. "You coming?"

Ryoga looked uncharacteristically troubled. "Ranma… look, you've gotta know what this all means, right?"

"Means?" Ranma double-checked the straps; if one gave while he was climbing, it could fatally unbalance him. The _best_ case scenario was that he'd lose all his gear. On top of that, he didn't put it past the old villain to have sliced at the straps so they _would_ give out, but he didn't notice any tampering.

"Yeah, idiot," Ryoga said. "I mean, that you were still with your father, when you came here. And, and that… you didn't remember me. Er, twice."

"What're you babblin' about, P-chan?" Ranma said, retreating to the kitchen to fill the two flasks with water.

"I just mean that maybe it's best to leave things the way they are," Ryoga said.

Ranma turned to stare. "Are you _nuts_?"

"I don't think you know what you're getting into."

Ranma blinked in surprise. "Right," he said, firmly capping each flask. "Listen, maybe Pops was right. Not about the other Ryoga, but about you. Maybe you're happy to see a kinder, gentler version of me, right? 'Cause that makes me that much easier to beat, and that's all you've ever wanted from me, isn't it?"

Ryoga jerked backwards as though Ranma had kicked him in the gut, blinking like the blow had taken him by surprise. "You idiot," he said, finally. "Don't know why I bother."

"Yeah," Ranma said as Ryoga retreated in a huff, calling for Akane. Well, at least he wouldn't get lost, then. "I dunno why, either."

* * *

"LET ME GO!" Ranma screamed, flailing his feet against his father's shoulders and back. "TAKE ME HOME!"

"Listen to you," Genma said. "Screaming like a little girl. That Ryoga's warped you."

"Warped?" Ranma whimpered.

"That's right," Genma said. "I know you don't understand right now, Ranma. You're too little to understand. That isn't your fault. But the Hibiki boy has corrupted you, tainted you. Gone back into your very past to change who you are. Made you a weak, helpless little girl early, so you'd never know what it was to be a man."

"I 'came a girl 'cause I disobeyed," Ranma muttered.

"What? Speak up, boy!"

"I said, _I became a girl because I disobeyed!_"

"Well, the boy's doubly foolish for punishing you with a girl body," Genma growled. "A man's got to work to be a Man Amongst Men. A man's got to work to be a man at all! Imagine how hard you'll have to work to be a man, now that you're in a little girl's body!"

Ranma bit his lip, hard, and a jounce against Genma's shoulder caused him to draw blood, but he didn't wince. All of this sounded wrong to him, wrong, wrong, _wrong_, but it also sounded… familiar. Right, in a way he couldn't deny. All of a sudden, he remembered the feeling of looking at the world through girl's eyes the first time, wondering if it was a sin to be curious. That feeling flooded back, now. What if Ryoga was wrong, and his father was right? What if being a girl had ruined him? What if his father's sort of man was the _only_ sort of man, and he'd thrown it all away to be a second-rate _girl_? Or worse, some kind of in-between thing that wasn't a proper girl or a Man Amongst Men?

What if he couldn't belong _anywhere?_

"That's why I had to take you away, Ranma," Genma went on. "I could tell that just being around Hibiki was damaging you. I had to get you away from him. To protect you."

But that didn't sound exactly right. "But you sent me away," Ranma said, wary.

Genma knelt, sliding Ranma down off his shoulder so that they could speak face to face. Ranma liked that; it was a trick of Ryoga's, he thought, but maybe his father did it, too. Maybe he just hadn't remembered.

"Sent you away?" Genma said, looking very sad indeed. "No, Ranma. I would never do a thing like that. I didn't think you were _real_. You have to understand the kinds of things I've seen. I've seen Mirror copies and body splits and possession. I would never have been so cruel to you if I'd known that it was really _you_, really _my son_!" Genma exclaimed, taking Ranma by the shoulders and shaking him. "Don't worry, boy. We'll fix it. I made you the best martial artist in Japan, once; I can do it again. We're going to have to train you out of some bad habits, of course…"

"But what about Ryoga?" Ranma offered up, tentative.

Genma's affectionate expression seemed to melt. "That second-rate excuse for a man is never going to get his hands on you again," he said fiercely. "Listen, Ranma. Your manhood can be taken away at any moment, by anyone. A man who thinks he's tougher than you, who insults you. A woman, who thinks that she can manipulate you with the promise of love. A boss who forced you to work under him."

"I haven't got any of those," Ranma said, honestly. He hoped that Akane would love him, someday, but it had hardly come to that.

"More than that," Genma explained. "What Ryoga's done is encouraged you to be feminine. And being feminine..." He laughed, derisive. "That can take away your manhood, too. That goes without saying."

Ranma frowned. He was picturing the covers of romance novels, and heart-shaped balloons, and frilly dresses in store windows chasing and attacking him. At any other time, he might have laughed at the image. But his daddy seemed deadly serious, as though this were not a laughing matter, so he put on the serious listening face he did for Ryoga.

But Ranma's listening face must not have been very convincing, because Genma added, more stringently, "If men think you're weak, then they'll take what's yours."

"Well," said Ranma. "What if you have friends who help you protect what's yours?"

Genma's eyes flashed. "A Man Amongst Men relies on no one but himself!"

Ranma felt miserable. Ryoga _must_ have been changing him. It used to be he could repeat some of this back to his daddy word-for-word, but now so much of it sounded so strange.

"If men think you're weak, they'll take what's yours," Genma repeated, but with straining patience, "and if they sense anything girly in you, they'll know you're weak."

Now, the picture Ranma got was scarier. Wolves, who could smell it when you weren't a Man Amongst Men. Sniffing you out. Tearing you limb from limb when they _discovered_ you, found out you weren't who you said you were, weren't _right_.

The thought terrified him. "But I _am_ strong, daddy!"

"Boys don't call their fathers _daddy_," Genma stressed. He paused. "I suppose I've always known this was in you. I've always known it was something that had to be chased out. Not just because of the contract…" he wavered. "Must be your mother's influence… should've taken you away sooner…"

Ranma found himself growing more and more panicked. If calling his own father _daddy_ had been so terrible, what had it meant that he'd kind of liked it when Ryoga had called him _sweetheart_? He'd known it was wrong – known it was a _girl-word_ at the time. He should never have let it happen!

"Perhaps I should give up on you, but I can't, as a father –"

Shampoo had it backwards. Ryoga had it all sideways, and upside-down. His daddy – his Pops was right. Of course he was. "No, Da… Pops! Please don't give up! I'll try harder, I swear!"

Genma smiled. "Good, Ranma. That's the first step. Now, let's see if we can take the next… together."

* * *

A/N:

This is the most anxious I've been during writing in a long time. Like, Draco-enduring-Cruciatus level of horror. I could barely write this chapter.

I've known all along that Genma was going to cause terrible trouble for tiny!Ranma, but a lot of said horror infusing this chapter comes from reading a recent article on the damaging nature of "what it means to be a man": how manliness is transitory, and can be taken from a man at any time. Think about the saying "handing in your man card" and asking someone if his wife/girlfriend carries his... er... MANhood... in her purse, when a man has done something we don't deem sufficiently brave, emotionless, or merciless. Men have to put down other men who aren't as MUCH men to feel like they ARE men. Or they could LOSE their ability to CALL themselves men. And Genma, more even than most parents, seems to see Ranma as an extension of himself, a reflection of his own hard work. Ranma is like a master painting he's been working on for sixteen years.

And, so far as he sees it, an inexperienced artist who thinks he can do a better job just scrawled all over HIS canvas. Perhaps for the sole purpose of degrading Genma's own work of genius, thereby proving himself the better artist.

This is the most villainous Genma I'll ever write, but I submit that he's in character. You are welcome to disagree. :)

I wish little Ranma were better at resisting what his father has to say, but it's how he was raised. And, unfortunately, even in the case of loved ones every bit as abusive as Genma in real life - and more! - people often become emotionally attached to their abusers, especially if the abuse comes from someone they believe _should_ love them who's in a position of natural authority, like a parent.

I went back to chapter one and added some warnings. I'm beginning to believe this story needs them.

Someone wrote me a message that might have been a personal issue, and might have been related to this story, but I highly suspect they were trolling. If that's not the case, then please don't look for help from strangers on the internet. Talk to a professional.

As always, I'd love to hear what you think.

-K


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